The Silver Ink

Friday, December 4, 2020
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Simple blood test can tell every virus the person had in his entire lifetime

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blood testAccording to a new study, as single drop of blood is all that scientists now need to identify every virus a person is now exposed to in their lifetime.

The test, which is still experimental, can be performed for as little as $25 and could become an important research tool for tracking patterns of diseases in various population, which can help scientists compare people in different parts of the world and can also compare the old and the young.

This test can also be used to find whether it is the virus or the body’s immune response to them, contribute to chronic diseases and cancer.

The test can detect past exposure to more than 1,000 strains of viruses from 206 species, pretty much the entire virome, i.e. all the viruses known to infect people.

The test works by detecting antibodies, highly specific proteins the immune system has made in responses to viruses.

Stephen Elledge, professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the lead author of the study said, “There are people walking around with chronic Hepatitis C infections that have no idea they have them. Now imagine if this was a routine test that was done every time you went to the doctor. With things like Hep C, the earlier you treat them, the better.”

Elledge added, “There are a number of diseases that could be initiated by a viral infection, so it’s an interesting idea to have a patient come in with a disease and say, let’s take a look at what viruses they’ve been exposed to.”

Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious-disease expert at Vanderbilt University said, “This will be a treasure trove for communicable disease epidemiology. It will be like the introduction of the electron microscope. It will allow us to have more resolution at a micro level.”

Dr. Elledge also says that they were surprised by what happened in people with HIV. He notes that they expected their immune responses to other viruses would be diminished. Instead, he says, they have exaggerated responses to almost every virus, and they don’t know why.

Dr. Elledge concluded, “While not perfect, we think this method represents a very large step forward toward the goal of comprehensive analysis of viral infections.”

Amazing diversity has been discovered among planktons

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planktons Scientists have discovered amazing diversity among planktons. Planktons include tiny plants, virus, embryonic fish that are favorite food of whales.

Planktons serve as the base of the marine food chain.

The organisms near the top of the food chain easily forget small microscopic organisms which contribute to their diverse diets.

Chris Bowler, research director at France’s National Center for Scientific Research and the co-author of the study said, “Planktons are much more than just food for the whales.”

Bowler added, “Although tiny, these organisms are a vital part of the Earth’s life support system, providing half of the oxygen generated each year on Earth by photosynthesis and lying at the base of marine food chains on which all other ocean life depends.”

Jennifer Brum oceanographer from University of Arizona said, “Since the most numerous members of the plankton are bacteria, the majority of viruses in the ocean are thought to infect bacteria.”

Scientist found that these organisms are more complex than they were imagined to be.

International scientist abroad Tara, the French Schooner, embarked on expeditions between 2009 and 2013 collected as many as 35,000 samples of planktons that included virus, fish larvae, bacteria and single cell algae, all from major regions in the ocean.

Scientists have sequenced 40 million genes of plankton making it the largest DNA sequencing project performed on marine science.

Researchers after sequencing all the genes found that most of the them were previously unknown to scientists.

Co-author of the study said, “A good way of thinking about this is that there are roughly 200 million viruses in every mouthful of seawater, and most of those viruses are infecting the roughly 20 million bacteria found in every mouthful of seawater.”

Scientists have sequenced genes of planktons and found them to be genetically diverse, but the diversity of marine mammals was actually lower than they had anticipated.

Sudden onset paralysis linked to last years respiratory virus

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doctorsUCSF scientists have discovered an evidence that same virus is causing the clusters of sudden onset paralysis which has left hundreds of US children with severe respiratory infections past year.

Most cases are found in California and Colorado.

The virus is the Enterovirus D68 that causes symptoms like cold but may cause serious illness.

It is appearing to have mutated to become polio like.

Dr Charles Chiu, lead author and head of the viral diagnostics laboratory at UCSF said, “The changes were always in the direction to make it more similar to polio, I want to make sure we don’t alarm people. There’s a chance this virus may never come back, which would be the best-case scenario. But we certainly need to be prepared.”

Dr. Emmanuelle Waubant, a UCSF neurologist who have treated some of the first California patients with sudden-onset paralysis but was not part of Chiu’s research said, “It’s a small study, and we’re not showing causality yet, but we’re really inching that way, this work is definitely going to encourage investigators to go back to the bench and try to really understand better the neurological complication potential of this virus.”

Chiu said, “It’s hard to predict what will happen this year or next year. Certainly enterorvirus will crop up again, the question is will it be this strain or another strain? This year will be very informative.”

Doctors said it is yet to be seen how concerning this virus can be.

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