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carbon20
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Posted: September 09 2015 at 5:03am |
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Prehistoric 'Frankenvirus' Mollivirus sibericum uncovered in Siberian permafrostScientists discover giant, ancient virusUnearthed in Siberia, researchers say the virus could be up to 30,000 years old but one Australian expert doubts their claim.
Scientists have revived a giant virus that has lain frozen under the Siberian tundra for 30,000 years. But the French researchers who discovered the long-dormant virus have warned that climate change has the potential to awaken more disease-causing viruses in the Arctic. The virus is called Mollivirus sibericum, which means soft Siberian virus, but lay observers have quickly dubbed it "Frankenvirus". In the world of viruses it is a monster, with 523 genetic proteins. The genome of the influenza virus, by comparison, encodes just 11 genetic proteins. Scanning electron microscopy of two isolated Mollivirus particles. Photo: PNAS Last year, the same team of French virus-hunters discovered another giant virus strain, Pithovirus sibericum, in the same sample of Arctic permafrost. Neither virus is harmful to humans or animals and both are hosted in common soil amoeba. However, the authors of the study said that "the fact that two different viruses could be easily revived from prehistoric permafrost should be of concern in [the] context of global warming". In their paper, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science , the researchers wrote: "Our finding suggests that prehistory 'live' viruses are not a rare occurrence." Further, they warn "we cannot rule out that distant viruses of ancient Siberian human populations could re-emerge as Arctic permafrost layers melt and/or are disrupted by industrial activities". Mollivirus particle at a late assembly stage. Photo: PNAS One of the researchers, Jean-Michel Claverie, said: "Some viral particles which are still infectious can, in the presence of a receptive host, [lead to] the resurgence of potentially pathogenic viruses in Arctic regions". He said that climate change is making the Arctic region more accessible for the extraction of mineral and oil resources, which could further expose such viruses. "If we are not careful, and we industrialise these areas without putting safeguards in place, we run the risk of one day waking up viruses such as smallpox that we thought were eradicated," Professor Claverie told Agence-France Presse. M. sibericum is the fourth giant virus discovered. The first of the giant viruses, Mimivirus, was found in 2003. The second family of giant viruses, the Pandoravirus, was found in 2013 in a pond in suburban Melbourne, at La Trobe University in Bundoora. Microbiologist Professor Ben Cocks in 2013 at the La Trobe University pond where the Pandoravirus was found. Photo: Ken Irwin Edward Holmes, a professor of infectious diseases and biosecurity at the University of Sydney, was cautious of the findings. "What's interesting [about the new virus] is viral diversity; it's cool that they're so big, and I'm querying the age, but the risk? None." "We are more at risk from the standard microbiological fauna that floats around," he told Fairfax Media. Representatives of the four 'giant' virus families: Mollivirus, Megavirus, Pithovirus and Pandoravirus under a scanning electron microscope. Photo: PNAS Professor Holmes said: "The problem with things this old is that DNA degrades quite quickly. So trying to get any material that is that old is very, very difficult. "The oldest pathogen [we have identified] is plague bacterium going back 1500 years - and that was was very degraded. Here you have an intact virus going back 30,000 years so it would have to have been absolutely, instantaneously frozen and [then experience] no thawing or degradation. That's a tough call for me ... I'd like the age to be independently verified." However, Professor Holmes said he isn't saying they're wrong: "If it is 30,000 years old, it's fantastic." Professor Edward Holmes, University of Sydney. Viruses have traditionally been thought of as small and simple organisms. However, the discovery of the Mimivirus in 2003 means that we now know viruses can be large and complex. Viruses are considered "giant" if they are longer than half a micron, or 0.0005 millimetres. Scientists hope that analysis of these giant viruses will help us better understand viral evolution and perhaps the origins of life itself. Professor Holmes said that humans first studied viruses that threatened humans and economically important animals and plants. However, it is now understood that we have just "scratched the surface of the virus-sphere". "There is an amazing diversity of viruses out there. They're in weird organisms, they're of different shapes and sizes - the giant viruses came as a real surprise - and the sea is full of them. And in most cases they have nothing to do with disease whatsoever," Professor Holmes said. "We've just missed an amazing diversity of life. Most DNA on earth is certainly in viruses." The discovery of a prehistoric giant virus will no doubt trigger memories for some of sci-fi thriller, The Thing, in which scientists operating in the Antarctic disturb a long-dormant, violent alien species. Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/sci-tech/prehistoric-frankenvirus-mollivirus-sibericum-uncovered-in-siberian-permafrost-20150909-gjial2.html#ixzz3lF4Kji2m Follow us: @smh on Twitter | sydneymorningherald on Facebook |
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Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.π
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Dutch Josh
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We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
~Albert Einstein |
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carbon20
Moderator Joined: April 08 2006 Location: West Australia Status: Offline Points: 65816 |
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what the world needs now is a really good virus
to save the planet from US.......
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Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.π
Marcus Aurelius |
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carbon20
Moderator Joined: April 08 2006 Location: West Australia Status: Offline Points: 65816 |
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SMARTNEWS Keeping you currentMicrobiologists Keep Finding Giant Viruses in Melting PermafrostResearchers find several new species in a single soil sample.By Danny Lewis SMITHSONIAN.COM For tens of thousands of years the Siberian permafrost has locked away relics of the past, from wooly mammoth bones to seeds. As climate change contributes to rising global temperatures, scientists are digging up more and more finds that used to be unreachable through the frozen earth β including several kinds of giant viruses. Most common viruses are incredibly tiny and typically only have about four genes or so, not even enough to be considered βaliveβ in the same way as a bacterium or a human cell. Giant viruses, on the other hand, are a different story. Sometimes as big as bacteria, giant viruses have much more genetic material, anywhere from hundreds to thousands of genes, Michael Byrne writes for Vice Motherboard. And as the permafrost melts, scientists are finding them more and more frequently. According to a new report, a group of microbiologists from several French and Russian institutions have just discovered a second new species of giant virus in a single sample of Siberian permafrost in just two years. Both, according to lead researchers Jean-Michel Claverie and Chantal Abergel, are viable even after 30,000 years of being frozen in the ground. "A few viral particles that are still infectious may be enough, in the presence of a vulnerable host, to revive potentially pathogenic viruses," Claverie tells AFP. "If we are not careful, and we industrialise these areas without putting safeguards in place, we run the risk of one day waking up viruses such as small pox that we thought were eradicated." < id="google_ads__/308522/smithsonianmag.tmus/smart-news_3" name="google_ads__/308522/smithsonianmag.tmus/smart-news_3" width="300" height="250" scrolling="no" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" border="0" style="-sizing: border-; border-width: 0px; border-style: initial; vertical-align: bottom;"> Claverie and Abergel were intrigued when they heard that a group of Russian scientists had managed to revive a seed found buried in the permafrost since the Late Pleistocene era. Wondering what else they might find, the husband-and-wife team began to probe the Russian sample, using amoebas as bait for any viruses that might have survived the deep freeze, Jen Christensen writes for CNN. βEvery once in a while, we see them die and that's when we know somebody must be killing them," Claverie tells Christensen. "This way, we know which to isolate from the others." The fact that they are still viable after such an immense period of time raises concerns for Claverie and Abergel that melting permafrost and Siberian mining operations could unleash more harmful pathogens, Byrne writes. As Claverie and Abergel note in the study:
While most discovered giant viruses exclusively target amoebas, at least one strain has been known to infect humans. But despite the drama of these discoveries, other researchers say that people should be less worried about the possibility of finding pathogens in the permafrost. βThis is a theoretical possibility, but in the absence of any evidence that this might be dangerous, I think we should worry about the viruses that could jump out of mammals on Earth right now,β Vincent Racaniello, a virologist at Columbia University tells Chris Mooney for The Washington Post. At the end of the day, there is no immediate danger from these ancient viruses, although it might be worth keeping an eye on anything else that comes out of the permafrost. In the meantime, these relics could give scientists new insights into what life was like tens of thousands of years ago. Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/microbiologists-keep-finding-giant-viruses-melting-permafrost-180956647/#S4YLpbPkMg52FUi7.99 Give the gift of Smithsonian magazine for only $12! http://bit.ly/1cGUiGv Follow us: @SmithsonianMag on Twitter |
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Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.π
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Dutch Josh
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http://www.diffen.com/difference/Bacteria_vs_Virus
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We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
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arirish
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Infectious Disease Experts Are Warning About a Possible Future Pandemic We Can't Control
Not everything that gets frozen alive stays dead. A team of French scientists is resurrecting pathogens from the last Ice Age and cautions that their findings indicate potentially hazardous pathogens could thaw in Siberia. Researchers from the University of Aix-Marseille's National Center of Scientific Research have isolated an amoeba-killing virus called Mollivirus sibericum in a 30,000-year-old chunk of Russian permafrost. It's the fourth new type of giant virus (viruses with complicated genomes that are large enough to be visible under common optical microscopes) to be discovered since 2003. It's also the second to be isolated from the same sample of permafrost. The researchers write in their study that like another permafrost virus they discovered last year, Pithovirus sibericum, they believe the pathogen can be brought back to life. By exposing the ancient virus to the single-celled amoebas, the scientists hope to entice any remaining contagious particles of the bug into leaving their dormant state. Here's where it gets worrisome: Mollivirus is completely benign, but scientists really don't know what else may be lurking deep in the Siberian permafrost. Permafrost in Siberia is melting at an alarming rate thanks to global climate change, thought to be the cause of gigantic, mysterious holes in the ground discovered last year on the region's Yamal Peninsula. As global warming both melts the permafrost and opens areas of northern Siberia up to increased resource extraction activity, many frozen microorganisms could reawaken. "Mining and drilling means bringing human settlements and digging through these ancient layers for the first time since millions years. If 'viable' virions are still there, this is a good recipe for disaster," lead researcher Jean-Michel Claverie wrote to Mic. "Permafrost is not ice. It is much richer in microbes of all kinds, and a much better preserver than ice. Everything is everywhere, as microbes go, and there is no more no less virus there than in other places." It's hard not to be reminded of the opening scene of 1998's The X-Files movie, in which a young boy encounters a long-hidden cache of a sinister disease called the black oil in a cave. "A few viral particles that are still infectious may be enough, in the presence of a vulnerable host, to revive potentially pathogenic viruses," Claverie told Agence France-Presse. "If we are not careful, and we industrialize these areas without putting safeguards in place, we run the risk of one day waking up viruses such as smallpox that we thought were eradicated." He noted that in addition to unknown diseases, permafrost could contain eradicated viruses like smallpox. That would be extremely bad news for humans, most of whom no longer receive smallpox vaccinations. Luckily for us, the risk is probably very low. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spokeswoman Callie Carmichael told Mic the CDC is not particularly concerned about frozen viruses, though the topic does "fit in our broader efforts to monitor emerging and re-emerging diseases globally." "Climate change is causing shifting vector ranges, altering distribution of vulnerable populations (both human and animal), and generally changing disease patterns," she said, "all of which CDC actively monitors to detect disease threats." According to Columbia University microbiologist and infectious disease specialist Vincent Racaniello, humans have better things to worry about than ancient plagues bubbling up from mysterious chasms in backwoods Siberia. "There is zero worry" about the kinds of viruses being studied by the NCSR team, Racaniello told Mic. "They're big viruses, they are really interesting, but they do not infect people ... until we have some evidence that there are some viruses there that can infect people, the possibility that there is one there is very low." Racaniello said viruses circulating around the world (including in environments like kitchen freezers) right now are much more dangerous. Virologists are constantly discovering new pathogens in animal populations across the globe that attract much less attention. "I'm more worried about viruses that are actually out there that are pathogenic," he said. Claverie, however, believes there is a "non-zero probability that the pathogenic microbes that bothered [human ancestors such as Neanderthals] could be revived, and must likely infect us as well." "Those pathogens could be banal bacteria (curable with antibiotics), or resistant bacteria, or nasty viruses," he said. "If they have been extinct for a long time, then our immune system is no longer prepared to respond to them. So yes, that could be dangerous." http://mic.com/articles/125289/infectious-disease-experts-are-warning-about-a-possibly-future-pandemic-we-can-t-control |
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Buy more ammo!
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Littleraven
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I've often thought of these viruses and bacteria that wake up due to global warming. What was once frozen and forgotten comes to life and finds a new world of vectors and hosts at its disposal. One of the theories proposed was that during one of the mass extinction die offs in Earth's past that viruses or bacteria played a major role.
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carbon20
Moderator Joined: April 08 2006 Location: West Australia Status: Offline Points: 65816 |
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been having a think,scary....
if these viruses appear because of global warming, i wonder if the increased UV light will just kill them, or is the danger that an animal will pick it up ?? |
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Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.π
Marcus Aurelius |
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Technophobe
Assistant Admin Joined: January 16 2014 Location: Scotland Status: Offline Points: 88450 |
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Both are possibilities. We just have to wait and see.
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How do you tell if a politician is lying?
His lips or pen are moving. |
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