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SCIENCE NEWS 
| 
February 12, 2022
MEETING NOTES
GENES & CELLS 
Genetic analysis hints at how 
COVID-19 messes with smell
One of the fastest tip-offs of having 
COVID-19 is the loss of taste or smell. 
Now researchers have pinpointed genetic 
variants that may make some infected 
people more likely to lose these senses.
A study of nearly 70,000 adults with 
COVID-19 found that people with certain 
genetic tweaks on chromosome 4 were 
11 percent more likely to lose the ability 
to smell or taste than people without the 
tweaks, researchers report January 17 
in 
Nature Genetics
. The data come from 
people who’d had their DNA analyzed by 
genetic-testing company 23andMe and 
self-reported a case of COVID-19.
Two genes that help people smell, 
UGT2A1
and 
UGT2A2
, reside in the 
region of chromosome 4 linked to sen-
sory loss, epidemiologist Janie Shelton 
of 23andMe and colleagues found. Both 
genes code for enzymes that metabo-
lize odor molecules. Studies suggest 
that loss of smell with COVID-19 stems 
from infections in smell-supporting cells 
called sustentacular cells. Variants near 
UGT2A1
and 
UGT2A2
could affect how 
the genes turn on or off, Shelton says.
The team asked about loss of smell 
and taste in one survey question so the 
study can’t parse whether the variants 
are involved in the loss of one sense over 
the other. “When you lose your sense of 
smell, often your taste is highly dimin-
ished,” Shelton says. Taste can also go 
away without loss of smell.
For some people, the loss of smell can 
last a long time. Knowing how the disease 
snuffs out sniffing ability could help 
researchers find ways to bring the sense 
back. 
— Erin Garcia de Jesús 
EARTH & ENVIRONMENT