With the outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 in Saudi Arabia, the call for genomic studies to understand the virus increased to allow for a better fight against it. This is also emphasized with the country’s diversity. This project aims to find and analyze the evolution of the virus in Saudi Arabia by finding its mutation rates and constructing a phylogenetic tree. Public Saudi SARS-CoV-2 data from the Global Initiative for Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAID) are used for the analysis. The analysis is performed by first doing the multiple sequence alignment (MSA). From that, a phylogenetic tree is constructed by using a distance matrix, which is also used to calculate the evolution rate. The results show that phylogenetic distinctions between the regions of study are small, signifying a homogeneous infection circle. The mutation rates calculated were comparable for all regions except for Makkah, which confirmed a higher mutation rate from an Analysis Of Variance (ANOVA), indicating the requirement of additional vigilance on the region. The higher mutation rate could be due to the city’s diverse population, suggesting the clinical importance of this region in the global health and clinical treatment of SARS-CoV-2 in Saudi Arabia. These findings emphasize the need to continuously conduct updated comparative genomics on SARS-CoV-2 to stay informed on its infection patterns that help make better decisions towards dealing with the pandemic.
