Midterm 3 Flashcards
(174 cards)
why do viruses want to go into a host?
it wants to replicate. thats it and in the case of humans the best way it can do that is by being passed on to more hosts.
its mindless
history of virus?
viral diseases have plagued humans since before we knew what they were – evidence for small pox in egypt
1800s we discovered viruses
walter reed
showed in 1901 that a human disease, yellow fever, was caused by a virus transmitted by a mosquito
viruses are defined as ______
intracellular obligate parasites
size of a virus
10 to 100 nm in size
can only see with electron microscope
viral genome has ____ nucleotides
a few thousand to 200,000 nucleotides in length
Sizes of viruses
HIV has 9200 bp for 9 genes
SARs-CoV-2 has 30000 bp which is large for a RNA virus
t or f viruses can be single or double stranded DNA or RNA
true
capsid
protein shell around genome composed of capsomere proteins
nucleocapsid
capsid and genome together
do all viruses have an envelope?
no! if they don’t they’re considered naked. an envelope is basically just a plasma membrane derived structure around capsid
shape of viruses
symmetry. tldr we have helical, polyhedral, and complex
capsids often exhibit either helical or polyhedral (iscosahedral = 20 triangular faces) shapes
can also have complex shapes. for example flu has 8 nucleocapsid structures
complex virus
bacteriophage head contains genome with elaborate tail structure
virion
viral particles that are infectious but they are metabolically inert
is a virus dead or alive?
depends on your definition of life!
replication cycle of a virus
attachment- stick on to host cell
entry (penetration/uncoating) - get into the cell and release genome
biosynthesis- replicate its genome and express its genes to make proteins
assembly- put everything together
exit- get the new virus particles out
coevolution
viruses orginated before the last universal common ancestor (LUCA), during the RNA world period and evolved along with their host cells.
descendents of the original RNA replicators in this view
no RNA viruses are known to infect any member of archaea AND some have proposed retroviruses as a case for transition from RNA world to DNA world BUT they only effect plants and animals so not really good enough
little evidence that this is true
regressive hypothesis
viruses are cells that lost some of the replicative and metabolic traits over time
doesnt adequately explain the origins of RNA viruses.
Giant DNA viruses are often cited as examples to support this hypothesis
example of regression is a tapeworm. used to be a real worm now he a creep
progressive hypothesis
most people prob think this is the way it happens
existing genetic elements gradually gained the ability to move from cell to cell
evidence in the form of transposons (for DNA viruses) and retrotransposons (for retroviruses)
how can we grow and quantify viruses?
bacteriophages –> add agar and then put on a nutrient agar base
animal viruses –> have to work with tissue culture of host cells to do viral cultivation.
what do we use for virus identifcation?
electron microscopy
nucleic acid analysis through pcr and reverse pcr
what is one thing that viruses always need the host cell for?
protein synthesis
bacteriophages
viruses that infect bacteria!
almost all have double stranded dna
almost always have complex morphology
most widely studied are viruses of e coli including t-even phages and phage lambda
bacteriophages have _____
double stranded dna most of the time