Question about Viruses

**WillBrink** · 04-02-20, 21:39

Originally Posted by tb-av

So can some of you doctors, scientist, researchers, etc. help me out here.

I have been doing a lot of reading lately as I suppose many people have but it ends up being either the same basic stuff or too science heavy.

I have always thought that a virus would morph, mutate, whatever layman's term might apply.

I've read articles where Iceland has found versions of the current virus... I don't even want to use the name because one name is a virus and one is disease. I'm sure you know what I mean.

I have always thought that a virus by nature was pretty much morphing or mutating for reasons unknown. That we adapt to some, some mutate and get worse or mutate and get less harmful. Various versions of a head cold so to speak.

When I look at this https://nextstrain.org/ncov I can't honestly say I understand it, but it looks like the far right dots are showing the various mutations of a single entity ( virus or disease )

Now I am being told that a virus never weakens. It is a static entity. It's not even alive. ???

Can someone explain to me in laymans terms what I am missing here?

As a secondary question. I have been told that hand sanitizer is not a good defense against a virus but is against a bacteria. So I feel like my confusion is related to that comment as well.

If a virus is not alive, exists in a static state, what does the hand sanitizer do?

I guess the short story is, what is a virus and what is it's typical existence? The analogy I was given was polio will always be polio, smallpox always smallpox and they will not weaken. Which makes sense too.

Is there any way to explain this in layman's terms? I have come to realize I have no idea what a virus is.

Actually, you can't imagine the can of worms that Q asks. Some believe the virus is the bridge entity between what's alive and what's not. They're not alive in the classic sense, yet their behavior is that of a living entity. Take a trip down the rabbit hole:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/a...es-alive-2004/

**tb-av** · 04-02-20, 22:11

Originally Posted by WillBrink

Actually, you can't imagine the can of worms that Q asks.

I kinda figured it might. Story of my life. I can go to the store looking for a hardware part that I think should be a normal everyday item..... 'oh we don't have that, I've never seen one'

Thanks for link. I'll check it out tomorrow.

**1168** · 04-03-20, 07:26

Originally Posted by tb-av

Thanks everyone.... @SomeOtherGuy still digesting your link. Need to finish reading and probably a re-read or two.

I've still got a mental block going on with mutations. Is a mutation a disease mutation? Or a virus mutation? I still can't get past a virus is set thing, then it attaches to a cell, that new life can then mutate? If that's the case then I suppose the host has to shed that new mutant. If that is the case then would the original and new mutant be the same level of dangerous? If things are random it seems like a mutant could be anything from no problem at all to way worse than original and anything in between.

Mutations occur in offspring. So, two brown bears in Canuckistan have some cubs. One of the cubs is white. Thats from a genetic mutation. Nature later determines if this new mutation gives the white cub an advantage over its peers, allowing it to replicate, or even replicate more than its peers. Many years later, perhaps there are many white bears, living further north than their ancestors did, with some dietary changes that match the shift in habitat. Turns out, the brown bears have continued to replicate parallel to the white ones. Because they are better adapted to THEIR habitat.

Brown Bear, Polar Bear, they are both still bears, and they will both eat you.

Viruses replicate much more rapidly than bears and in greater numbers. So there is more opportunity for nature to experiment with mutations.

There is more to this than that, but this is the gist of it.

**sundance435** · 04-03-20, 10:03

Originally Posted by 1168

Mutations occur in offspring. So, two brown bears in Canuckistan have some cubs. One of the cubs is white. Thats from a genetic mutation. Nature later determines if this new mutation gives the white cub an advantage over its peers, allowing it to replicate, or even replicate more than its peers. Many years later, perhaps there are many white bears, living further north than their ancestors did, with some dietary changes that match the shift in habitat. Turns out, the brown bears have continued to replicate parallel to the white ones. Because they are better adapted to THEIR habitat.

There is more to this than that, but this is the gist of it.

I don't think natural selection is a good point of reference for genetic mutations, at least as applied to viruses - also where the living or not debate comes into play. Viral mutations occur at random - whether they are beneficial or not is also random, but a non-beneficial mutation does not get weeded out. There is no "natural selection" for virus mutations through breeding and propagation. Most viruses eventually become less potent because the mutations occur rapidly and at random. Given enough mutations, it will naturally be less deadly to the host 80% of the time.

**WillBrink** · 04-03-20, 10:14

Originally Posted by sundance435

I don't think natural selection is a good point of reference for genetic mutations, at least as applied to viruses - also where the living or not debate comes into play. Viral mutations occur at random - whether they are beneficial or not is also random, but a non-beneficial mutation does not get weeded out. There is no "natural selection" for virus mutations through breeding and propagation. Most viruses eventually become less potent because the mutations occur rapidly and at random. Given enough mutations, it will naturally be less deadly to the host 80% of the time.

As I recall, the general tendency of viruses is to become less virulent over time as those viruses that don't make people as sick/kill people, will tend to propagate themselves through a population best. Viruses that kill their host are less likely to be able to spread vs one that makes people mildly sick and so, one stops propagating while the less virulent version continues on. That was the basic theory I had learned, but that was a while ago. It's always a battle between host defenses and viral propagation. This is a good read I thought:

"Natural selection thus favored reductions in virulence. But it did not favor substantial reductions. Benign strains, it turned out, were also less infectious, this time because host immunity was able to control and clear them more rapidly. This work—the time series of isolates tested in a common garden and the experimental dissection of the relationship between virulence and transmission—made MYXV the poster child of virulence evolution: a highly lethal pathogen became less lethal over time. But it was still pretty nasty. It had not become benign"

https://www.the-scientist.com/featur...esistant-30219

**sundance435** · 04-03-20, 11:20

Originally Posted by WillBrink

As I recall, the general tendency of viruses is to become less virulent over time as those viruses that don't make people as sick/kill people, will tend to propagate themselves through a population best. Viruses that kill their host are less likely to be able to spread vs one that makes people mildly sick and so, one stops propagating while the less virulent version continues on. That was the basic theory I had learned, but that was a while ago. It's always a battle between host defenses and viral propagation. This is a good read I thought:

"Natural selection thus favored reductions in virulence. But it did not favor substantial reductions. Benign strains, it turned out, were also less infectious, this time because host immunity was able to control and clear them more rapidly. This work—the time series of isolates tested in a common garden and the experimental dissection of the relationship between virulence and transmission—made MYXV the poster child of virulence evolution: a highly lethal pathogen became less lethal over time. But it was still pretty nasty. It had not become benign"

https://www.the-scientist.com/featur...esistant-30219

I think I agree with what you're saying. A mutation that results in a more or less deadly virus is not evolutionary (in the animal sense, which is generally, though not always, beneficial). If hosts are better able to tolerate it, that particular strain may propagate more, but it didn't "evolve" as living things do. Viruses just keep replicating RNA with minor variances each time that continue to pile onto each other, never being weeded out. I guess what I'm saying is that unlike complex living organisms where more desirable mutations propagate through the effects of higher likelihood to survive and breed, it's totally random with a virus and good and bad mutations carry on on top of one another because there's no real selection. Eventually, all of the mutations counteract each other to some extent.

I'm probably butchering several biological processes and theories here, but my understanding is that there is a key difference primarily because a virus is technically non-living.

**Dirk Williams** · 04-03-20, 12:10

Was in Reno earlier this week, had an Chinese guy standing right behind me hacking and cuffing all over me. Asked him nicely twice to move back, " we were checking out" this idiot steps even closer, I snapped I reached out and popped him on the ear, hard enough that he took off, howling in some lingo I didn't recognize, leaving his cart. The folks behind us, told us he was initially at the back of the long line, did this hacking and sneezing on everybody who allowed him to,crowd in front of them. After he ran off, everybody laughed, the checkout folks were smiling, and his full cart got pushed off to some obscure corner of the store.

Long story, I got sick as a dog, was beginning to think I had the bug, awoke this morning feeling fine. I know I shouldn't of hit him, just tired of those pushy folks. He knew exactly what he was doing, I'm guessing nobody's ever popped his ear drum inside a store, before.

As I walked by the food court, pushing our cart, three guys with heavy tats, stood up and clapped.

DW

**J8127** · 04-03-20, 13:07

Originally Posted by Dirk Williams

Was in Reno earlier this week, had an Chinese guy standing right behind me hacking and cuffing all over me. Asked him nicely twice to move back, " we were checking out" this idiot steps even closer, I snapped I reached out and popped him on the ear, hard enough that he took off, howling in some lingo I didn't recognize, leaving his cart. The folks behind us, told us he was initially at the back of the long line, did this hacking and sneezing on everybody who allowed him to,crowd in front of them. After he ran off, everybody laughed, the checkout folks were smiling, and his full cart got pushed off to some obscure corner of the store.

Long story, I got sick as a dog, was beginning to think I had the bug, awoke this morning feeling fine. I know I shouldn't of hit him, just tired of those pushy folks. He knew exactly what he was doing, I'm guessing nobody's ever popped his ear drum inside a store, before.

As I walked by the food court, pushing our cart, three guys with heavy tats, stood up and clapped.

DW

I don't know whether to call you a liar or applaud your trolling- but nothing you just said happened.