How do diseases mutate themselves?

[Hayabusa Rider]

Originally posted by: sandorski
Anti-biotics directly attack bacterial infections, killing the bacteria.

Anti-viral drugs don't attack viruses directly(this certainly was true, don't know if it is completely true for all anti-viral drugs these days), they bolster the natural human immune system. Innoculations against Small Pox, Hep A/B, and other Viral diseases work by triggering the Anti-bodies within the innoculated person to attack a weakened virus. By doing this, the Anti-bodies "learn" to recognize a certain Virus, thus the next time the Virus enters the body, it is acted upon quickly. If the Anti-bodies do not "know" a Virus, the Virus will infect the body with no resistance.

I'm not a medicaly trained professional, the above is just my educated understanding of the situation.

There are antivirals that inhibit replication. Do that and no virus.

 

[0roo0roo]

Originally posted by: kleinesarschloch
god mutates disease. it is not appropriate for mortals to speculate about that.

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: theNEOone

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: Nocturnal
Like this new form of pneumonia... how did it become such a new and stronger form of an already existing disease?

The same way any other organism does. They breed with another compatible similar organism, swapping genes.. creating a new one.

Sometimes it happens by accident(pneumonia), sometimes it happens on purpose(africanized honeybees).

um, no. viruses don't "breed" or "swap genes" in the way you're explaining it. you can't compare a virus (which for the most part isn't even considered a form of life) to a multicellular organism such as a honey bee.

McPhreaks explanation (along w/ Hayabusarider's additions) is the simplest but most accurate way of answering your question.

Hmm... so viruses do not, under any circumstances, reproduce sexually?

 

[theNEOone]

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: theNEOone

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: Nocturnal
Like this new form of pneumonia... how did it become such a new and stronger form of an already existing disease?

The same way any other organism does. They breed with another compatible similar organism, swapping genes.. creating a new one.

Sometimes it happens by accident(pneumonia), sometimes it happens on purpose(africanized honeybees).

um, no. viruses don't "breed" or "swap genes" in the way you're explaining it. you can't compare a virus (which for the most part isn't even considered a form of life) to a multicellular organism such as a honey bee.

McPhreaks explanation (along w/ Hayabusarider's additions) is the simplest but most accurate way of answering your question.

Hmm... so viruses do not, under any circumstances, reproduce sexually?

not to my knowledge. it is my understanding that sexual reproduction (swapping genes, in the most basic sense) does not occur in viruses. there are scenarios where recombination ("swapping") occurs between homologous sequences of two viruses, and sometimes also between DNA of viruses and other organisms (in fact, this is the mechanism many viruses use to integrate their DNA into genomes of higher organisms.) this recombination has the effect of "swapping genes" or parts of genes, but as far as biology is concerned, although some swapping occurs, it is not a form of sexual reproduction because such a scenario is not an absolute requirement (and is rare in many cases) for viruses to replicate.

 

[OulOat]

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: theNEOone

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: Nocturnal
Like this new form of pneumonia... how did it become such a new and stronger form of an already existing disease?

The same way any other organism does. They breed with another compatible similar organism, swapping genes.. creating a new one.

Sometimes it happens by accident(pneumonia), sometimes it happens on purpose(africanized honeybees).

um, no. viruses don't "breed" or "swap genes" in the way you're explaining it. you can't compare a virus (which for the most part isn't even considered a form of life) to a multicellular organism such as a honey bee.

McPhreaks explanation (along w/ Hayabusarider's additions) is the simplest but most accurate way of answering your question.

Hmm... so viruses do not, under any circumstances, reproduce sexually?

Some scientists don't even consider viruses alive because they have no reproduction system. In order to reproduce, they must "unite" their RNA or DNA with that of a hosts and wait till the host cell divides. A quote from dictionary.com, "Any of various simple submicroscopic parasites of plants, animals, and bacteria that often cause disease and that consist essentially of a core of RNA or DNA surrounded by a protein coat. Unable to replicate without a host cell, viruses are typically not considered living organisms. " Because their structure is so simple, I think scientists have already created a virus from scratch. Not a very strong one, but it does show what's on the horizon.

 

[Fausto]

Originally posted by: sandorski
Anti-biotics directly attack bacterial infections, killing the bacteria.

Anti-viral drugs don't attack viruses directly(this certainly was true, don't know if it is completely true for all anti-viral drugs these days), they bolster the natural human immune system. Innoculations against Small Pox, Hep A/B, and other Viral diseases work by triggering the Anti-bodies within the innoculated person to attack a weakened virus. By doing this, the Anti-bodies "learn" to recognize a certain Virus, thus the next time the Virus enters the body, it is acted upon quickly. If the Anti-bodies do not "know" a Virus, the Virus will infect the body with no resistance.

I'm not a medicaly trained professional, the above is just my educated understanding of the situation.

You're talking about vaccinations....not antiviral therapy. Antivirals work by disrupting the viral life cycle in some way. AZT (the HIV/AIDS drug), for example, is a nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor. Reverse transcriptase is an enzyme required by a virus to replicate itself using the cell it has hijacked. Supress that enzyme and you can slow the virus' rate of replication. It does not, however, do anything to the virii directly, so you can knock the viral load down to almost nothing this way but it will rebound (it hides rather well) once you stop the therapy.

A good and fairly short summary of the HIV "life cycle" in a host.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Originally posted by: OulOat

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: theNEOone

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: Nocturnal
Like this new form of pneumonia... how did it become such a new and stronger form of an already existing disease?

The same way any other organism does. They breed with another compatible similar organism, swapping genes.. creating a new one.

Sometimes it happens by accident(pneumonia), sometimes it happens on purpose(africanized honeybees).

um, no. viruses don't "breed" or "swap genes" in the way you're explaining it. you can't compare a virus (which for the most part isn't even considered a form of life) to a multicellular organism such as a honey bee.

McPhreaks explanation (along w/ Hayabusarider's additions) is the simplest but most accurate way of answering your question.

Hmm... so viruses do not, under any circumstances, reproduce sexually?

Some scientists don't even consider viruses alive because they have no reproduction system. In order to reproduce, they must "unite" their RNA or DNA with that of a hosts and wait till the host cell divides. A quote from dictionary.com, "Any of various simple submicroscopic parasites of plants, animals, and bacteria that often cause disease and that consist essentially of a core of RNA or DNA surrounded by a protein coat. Unable to replicate without a host cell, viruses are typically not considered living organisms. " Because their structure is so simple, I think scientists have already created a virus from scratch. Not a very strong one, but it does show what's on the horizon.

Something to help you guys sleep