Moreover,everything about DNA is subject to what is broadly called “regulation”. The story that DNA ultimately codes for proteins is an extraordinarily simplistic explanation. There is so much more to it, most of which we do not understand.

As for the argument that viruses don't share a common structure… Viruses rapidly evolve; it's one of the major reasons for their tremendous success. This rapid evolution makes it difficult to say that viruses don't share things in common. We have little idea what the early earth was like, but it is obvious that conditions have changed since the origin of “life.” As viruses adapted to new hosts they altered their genetic makeup to make them better equipped for a certain host.

The fact that there is not a common ancestor does not mean that it never existed. That is just illogical and completely unsupported. Cellular life leaves fossilized evidence. We are learning that viruses do as well, but it is much (MUCH) more difficult to collect this data (viruses are much smaller than cells).

Sun F-J, Caetano-Anolle´s G (2008) Evolutionary Patterns in the Sequence and Structure of Transfer RNA: Early Origins of Archaea and Viruses. PLoS
Comput Biol 4(3): e1000018. doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000018

http://www.360huoyuan.com

They discovery of Sputnik- a virus that infects a virus also adds weight to this argument.

Any genetic material capable of replicating can be considered “living”. It will only be a matter of time, loss of old dogma and a broader view of life sciences that will result in this idea becoming universal…

our race is so hideously fixated on saving EVERYONE that we do not take in account the future

we are AFRAID of natural selection.

Don't apologize for questions – here at virology blog there aren't any bad questions. We want to teach virology so all inquiries are welcome. In fact your questions are excellent.

Having a discussion board is a great idea. I'll look into the software to run it. As for your questions:

1. Chromosomes were known for many years to be composed of both protein and DNA, and scientists didn't know which was the genetic material. A key experiment was done in 1944 when Avery, McLeod and McCarty showed that DNA could induce a change in bacterial phenotype. In 1952 Hershey and Chase provided further support for DNA as genetic material, by showing that the DNA, and not protein, enters cells during a viral infection.

2. Vaccines mimic (although not always perfectly) what happens in a natural infection – the production of immunity to the virus. This immune response clearly exerts selective pressure on the virus. A perfect example is the yearly antigenic change of influenza virus that is selected each year by population immunity. Some viruses, like poliovirus, are not antigenically variable and probably not subject to such selective forces.

Great questions for discuss. I hope you don't mind laypersons (electrical engineers like myself) in asking a few questions I've been thinking about! One recommendation is perhaps a you can setup a general discussion area on this website for oddball questions like mine or others that aren't easily catagorized.

This thread is about as broad as any other, so here are a couple of unconventional ideas I've had -

1. Did you ever think, at a more primary fundamental level, perhaps proteins/amino acids themselves were the actual “intelligence” rather than DNA “driving the show”. Perhaps DNA is merely just a scoffolding which the amino acids decide to hang their hats. Perhaps there is something beyond the interaction between amino acids – beyond mere biochemstry? (Perhaps it sounds really strange)

2. Did you ever wonder if, by the broad use of vaccines, we are exerting an artificial stress on the ecology of a virus, thereby essentially resulting in a stronger virus to be selected down the road? Sort of like the National forest park policy of preventing fires for for so many decades, thus creating conditions in which much larger, horrendous forest fires can now occur.

Like I said, I'm interested about learning more. So I hope you don't mind my lack of exact terminology or my understanding in terms of the basic concepts of virology

- Bill

Viruses and the tree of life…