# Homework 7 **1. Name a gene that has a lot of these premature stop codon variants.** The nucleocapsid protein encoding gene (NC) ![](https://i.imgur.com/UqbjOK5.png =300x) Figure 1. last section of SARS-CoV-2 mRNAs alignment using UCSC Genome Browser tool (http://genome.ucsc.edu). The alignment is highlited in light blue color. The black bars represent the stop codons in variants which seems higher in the NC gene. **2. Provide a hypothesis about why this gene has more premature stop codon variants than other genes in the genome.** Since the nucleocapsid is a structural protein it might play a role in the immunity generated in the host and that can lead a pressure of selection of certain strains generating variants.