After reading the book The Hot Zone, I have become extremely interested in viruses and how they work. In that book, it is suggested that viruses were among the original life forms on Earth. Is this credible? Also, I would like to learn about how they develop and mutate, and why some are so infectious while others are very hard to catch. Please help me!
122054
It is possible that viruses may have been among the original forms of life on this planet, however that is hotly contested.  It is even contested as to whether or not viruses are actually living.\n\nVirology is an entire field of it's own.  Their development, and how they mutate is quite a complicated subject.  I would recommend getting started with a basic biology text book and reading the sections on molecular biology, and viruses.  I think it would help you quite a lot in understanding what viruses are, and how it is that they function... and that not all are bad.  In fact there is evidence that some viruses have actually inserted themselves in the human genome and now serve a functional role in our development.
374913
I just asked a question about the Montauk Project myself.I read the books.They seem to be very technically correct about a lot of the  things they talk about.So who-ever wrote them wasn't an idiot or a nut making up a story. I believe that the things spoken of in the stories are more than likely possible.Whether or not they actually happened as it is written,or if we really do possess this secret technoIogy, I don't know.In a way though,I kind of hope it isn't completely true,because the story of these projects are filled with abuse and inhuman treatment of human beings in the name of scientific developement and whatever else.
220103
I wouldn't say that I'm anymore intelligent than someone else, but I did want to answer your question, so....\n\nYou are confusing the theory of evolution (diversification of species) with the theory of abiogenesis (life from natural compounds).  That's okay, many people confuse the two.\n\n1.  How did life get from soup to single-celled organisms?  From wikipedia, "J.B.S Haldane suggested that the earth's pre-biotic oceans - very different from their modern counterparts - would have formed a "hot dilute soup" in which organic compounds, the building blocks of life, could have formed.\nIn 1953, taking their cue from Oparin and Haldane, the chemists Stanley L. Miller and Harold C. Urey carried out an experiment on the "primeval soup". Within two weeks organic amino acids, the basic building blocks of life, had formed. While Miller and Urey did not actually create life; they demonstrated that a more complex molecule — the amino-acids — could emerge spontaneously from simpler chemicals, in the presence of an external energy source in an atmosphere largely devoid of oxygen (the experiment involved shooting a spark, representing lightning, into their flask of supposedly primitive earth-gases)."\n\n2.  How did the original cell eat and develop asexual reproduction?   You are putting the cart before the horse.  In order to get to the cell stage, self-replicating molecules had to exist first... i.e. reproduction & "nourishment"  was occurring well before the cell stage.  Also, what are you referring to with "nourishment"?  For a self-replicating molecule, nourishment would consist of other molecules that it could combine with to form more of itself.\n\n3.  In the "soup", how did primordial cells develop resistences?  Resistence to what?  I don't understand this question.  To the environment?  To viruses or bacteria?  You need to elaborate here, I'm sorry.  I think it ties into your next answer, but not sure.  Please read my answer to #4.\n\n4.  How did it evolve everything it needed if it wasn't in it's DNA?  Can you give an example?  Hmm.  I'm trying to understand how you are approaching this question.  Let's say you have 100 little cells, each a little different.  5 cells can withstand a higher water temperature than the others because of a mutation they have.  One day the temperature goes up and kills off the other 95 cells.  That only leaves the 5 with the mutation.  They scamper off and reproduce like crazy... the cell strain has just evolved a little.  Now repeat this a gazillion times with a dynamic interacting environment and there you go.
273380
Ok, guys, I just received the same notice from someone on my buddy list.  Since I don't just blindly accept it when someone tells me about a virus or any such stuff (Have been burned by believing that before!!!) I decided to do some checking on the net.  On the trendmicro website I found some information stating that the j_neutron07 "virus" is just a hoax.  Nothing on snopes.com just yet either way. As always, the choose is yours as to whether you want to believe or not, just be informed before you decide!!!
266981
Actually, I've heard the virus was inteentionally released in the first place and there has always been a cure.\n\nCould be just another wild conspiracy theory of course, but who knows?
173328
Viruses are in a nether world. They are neither dead nor alive, and they certainly don't belong to a phylum or a class.
318971
viruses are considered non-living because they do not meet all the criteria of the generally accepted definition of life.\n\nalso, viruses are not typically considered to be organisms because they are not capable of independent reproduction or metabolism. this controversy is problematic, though, since some parasites and endosymbionts are incapable of independent life either. \n\nhowever, according to the united states code, viruses are considered to be microorganisms in the sense of biological weaponry and malicious use.\n\nso, in essence... \n\nif you follow the united states code that considers viruses as microorganisms, then the viruses which has rna as their genetic material are the only organisms with rna genome.
172785
You're absolutely right. There are millions, if not billions, of these 'common colds'.\n\nThe reason for it being so is because the viruses keep mutating and shuffling their genetic materials, thus producing new strains- all the time. These new strains are infective to us and no vaccine is able to stop them, as the vaccine is prepared to stop the older strains.\n\nSo far, take for example the rhinovirus- the main offender, has more than 80 strains and counting... What more to say of the rest of the viruses that cause the 'common cold', with their own multitude of genetic strains?
440987
Hi:\n\nMiller's experiment did just that... produced organic matter from inorganic matter, simulating the primitive conditions. What is believed to have happened after that is difficult to simulate as it was a random process of associations of the various organic compounds to form primitive complex structures, like say even catalytic RNA. This would have taken millions of years in itself and is difficult to reproduce in vitro.\n\nIf it is of some consolation to you, scientists have created a virus from scratch, about a year ago and the results were published in Nature.\n\nCheers!!
294258
I don't know how viruses work. I guess it is possible but wait for the other answers. People do horrible things these days with computers.
155652
A virus (not bacteria) is made up primarily of DNA and a protein coat.  They invade the cells of a living organism and destroy the host's DNA, then inject their own DNA into the host cell.  The result is that the infected cell produces new viruses which then exit the host cell and are released to infect others.  This is done because viruses do not contain cells with the orrganells and compounds necessary to reproduce, so they must get cells from the host to do the work for them.  Of course, the host cell is no longer functional as an intact cell once the virus leaves.
44713
Ahem. People, he's asking about the RATE of change. Not whether changes occur or whether evolution occurs. He clearly already knows that.\n\n__________________________________\n\nWell done. You’ve asked one of the most controversial questions in current evolutionary biology.  Much debate rages about this subject right now. \n\nWhat you are describing is commonly referred to as the evolution of evolvability. As you point out, if a population doesn’t have sufficient variation then environmental change could lead to extinction. But at the same time if the population is too variable the outliers will simply perish in current conditions. For example if elephants contained the inherent variability to produce young twice as big or the size of a rabbit those individuals would die.\n\nThe belief was for 100 years or so that the selective pressure of current environment would maintain a fairly tight rein on variability, that mutation rates were approximately constant and that survival in times of change was simply a case of pot luck. But then people started to look at the fossil record and the real world and it seemed like that wasn’t plausible. Novelties seemed to appear almost overnight, and they appeared almost any time they were needed. \n\nSo then came the concept of punctuated equilibrium. The idea that  a population would sit still for long periods, then as conditions changed they would suddenly leap forwards into a radically different form. That was all well and good, but it was basically just a restatement of the observations, not really an explanatory theory.\n\nIn the past 15 years ago there has been a lot of debate about the idea that organisms have evolved to evolve. That they have evolved in such a way that they are physically stable in times of environmental stasis, but when the environment becomes stressful change they can either mutate more, or reshuffle genes or express pattern of dormant genes to produce stable phenotypic novelties at rates that far exceed background rates.\n\n\nThe theory certainly makes sense. It’s hard to argue that such a trait wouldn’t; be a survival advantage. Unfortunately the evidence is ambiguous. And at the moment there are umpteen dozen theoretical mechanisms to explain how it could occur, and they are impossible to separate out. There is some work which has shown that many species can open up dormant genetic material for expression and re-assortment in response to stress (see first link below). And some experimental evidence suggests mutation rates increase in response to environmental change. Some say that prions are the key. Other favour inherent genetic instability in those individuals that survive initial changes, meaning that the decedent population is inherently prone to genetic varaiation until the environment stabilises and kills of the outliers again. Other propose that assortment of populations within the same or closely related species could explain it. But at this point we can’t even prove that genetic variation does change under stress. But at this point we just don’t know. \n\nYou ask a damn good question but the concept is hard to study and harder to establish with any certainty.\n\n_______\n>>>>Being able to actually understand how, and under what\n>>>> circumstances mutations happen strikes me as extremely\n>>>> important.\n\nWe've actually got a pretty good handle on how and when mutations occur. This is more of a question of when they are expressed or encouraged. Organisms have the ability repair genetic damage thorugh several mechanisms. They also have the ability shield the nucleus fom many mutagens. The issue is whether they may be able to damp down those processes to encourage more mutations.\n\n>>>> I can definitely see that species that do not have the \n>>>>capability to mutate in response to external forces\n>>>> would be selected against.\n\nYes, it's a rather hard
454463
In Bill Brysons book 'a short history of nearly everything' the likelihood of us coming to earth as protein chains from other planets is discussed.  There is a wealth of evidence to support this theory.  The question that this brings up however, is who or where did the protein come from in the first place.  This is discussed as well, but even having read it twice, I'm still not sure what to think.
124660
Probably not, at least not on this planet. Life as we know it incorporates nucleic acid within a cellular body (ie bacteria, human cells).  Prions are not alive, nor are viruses, according to the strict definition of biologists: Does it consume nutrients and convert it to energy?  Does it replicate without a host?  Does it excrete waste?  There are other standards, too.  Basically all cellular organisms fit into this definition does, but viruses are simply packaged DNA/RNA and protein.  Prions are just proteins, not alive.
206768
Ah the grays! My mortal enemies...gurr, actually they're not bad guys when you get to know them. Anyway, do real aliens exist?? Of course they do! Maybe not humanoids visiting the earth, but cirtainly if similar conditions to here exist on other celestial bodies (which we know to be true) the life will develop (parhaps just in a single cell form) from the components. Also there is some evidence to suggest bacterial life, or possibly the existance of virus compounds on comets, that why people get ill when they fly near the earth. If there are aliens that are anything like people, thats another matter.
468496
The HIV virus has been a living virus in the animal kingdom since time in the beginning. Your pet cat has the virus. What happen was this - as this world over populated and people began to starve, corruption in every corner of the globe, people ate parts of the "monkey" , the brains in fact, for the first time, and that is how the virus entered mankind. Now through bi-sexuality - it spread, and you know that you can be in any part of the world in less then 4-hrs - that is how it travelled into our countries. There will never be a cure for it, as man does not have the DNA link to the animal DNA - the only cure is safe sex, and unfortunately that is not working, or sinking into the heads of our young people. 4 young people and hour, under the age of 34 - (14-34) male and female, contract the AIDS virus an hour! in North America!! we are not far behind the 3rd worlds which have millions dying and dead from this uncontrollable disease. A generation of children are now orphans with both parents dead from HIV. Pass it on and only have safe sex. Good question - Check out "Bono's" site, big web and lots of info on this subject and on feed the world.
123773
First, you need to define evolution.  You're talking about micro evolution which has no problems with Christianity.  When you start getting into macro, stellar, cosmic and chemical evolution, we've got problems.\n\nIf the ebola virus evolved, it evolved from another virus.  That is micro evolution.  Macro evolution says that that process is evidence that a virus can turn into a dog over time.  This is where you're getting into religious faith and not science.  \n\nThere are hundereds of different breeds of dogs to include wolves and foxes, etc.  Micro evolution says that all those breeds of dogs came from a common ancestor...a dog.  Again, no problem with Christianity.\nMacro evolution will say that the dogs, cats, birds, snakes, plants, blah, blah, all came from a common ancestor.  That's ludicrous and severely contradicts the bible.\n\nNow, as far as your question about before the fall of man...\nGod told Adam that if they ate of the fruit, they would die.  We know that they didn't drop dead on the spot, so what did He mean?  He meant that they would change world events to bring death into the world.\n\nThe world event that possibly changed all of this was the flood.  When man knowingly was sinful (because of Adam), God had to destroy the world (death from the sin of Adam).  Before the flood, the earth had much different living conditions than we do today.  There was the protective canopy of water around the earth that made it paradise.  It increased the oxygen and air pressure to double, it blocked UV rays and had many other benefits.  This is how people were able to live to be 900 years old.\nIt's possible that viruses and other diseases started forming after that protective canopy was gone.  Add in man's industrial chemicals and we've got a recipe for disaster.\nThere was research done with poisonous snakes.  They put the snakes in a hyperbaric chamber and pumped the air pressure to double.  The snakes came out non-poisonous.  How was the world before the flood?  We can't know for sure, but some amazing scientific research has been done on this topic.\n\nAnother possibility is that many viruses were always there, but was just recently released because we went into the rain forest and started cutting down trees.  If it was locked in its environment before and we released it, then it didn't evolve, it was discovered.\n\nYou should check out www.drdino.com and download the seminar titled "The garden of Eden".  It will explain these things in much greater detail.