The moment coronavirus infects a healthy cell captured under microscope

Scientists at Latin America's largest medical research centre ​have captured images of the coronavirus infecting healthy cells under a powerful electron microscope.

The photographs were taken while experts at the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), in Brazil, studied the replication of the virus, which has killed more than 120,000 people across the world since emerging in China in December last year.

The telescope they used magnifies objects up to two million times their normal size and allowed the team to peer inside a cell and witness virus molecules piercing the membrane and infecting it.

The cells studied were isolated from the African green monkey and are frequently used in lab tests as stand-ins for human ones.

"Scientists used viruses isolated from samples collected from the nose and throat of an infected patient," the Fiocruz institute said.

“The record is unprecedented in Brazil," it added.

Their images show a series of dark points that are actually viral particles of the pathogen, known as Sars-CoV-2.

The most crucial pictures reveal the virus breaking through the cell membrane wall and entering the cytoplasm - inside which is the cell nucleus that contains its genetic material.

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Research institutions around the world are racing to study Covid-19 in close detail in order to try and find out how to stop it.

There is currently no vaccine for the virus.