Thursday, April 27, 2017

Roosters Teach Us How the Body Fights Viruses?

The human body is always fighting off infectious diseases such as bacteria, viruses, or parasites that want to take over cells. While cells in the body my fall to these enemies and be taken over, germ cells (sperm and egg) have a unique way of fighting off these little beasties. It turns out that to protect genetic information and pass it on accurately, germ cells have what is called piRNA. PiRNA is found mostly in the testes and ovaries and protects germ cells by subduing genetic sequences of intruders. This is a cool discovery and can maybe be used to create something like piRNA that we can use as medicine to cure sickness caused by some bacteria, viruses, and parasites.






https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/04/170427112149.htm

https://elifesciences.org/content/6/e24695

2 comments:

  1. I think that this discovery makes a lot of sense; we don't often hear about germ cells being infected by a virus. It is obviously important that an individual protect their reproductive cells' DNA so that they are able to have viable offspring. Hopefully by exploring this mechanism more fully, it can be used to create antibiotics for harmful illnesses causes by these bacteria, viruses, etc.

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  2. I really liked this article and hopefully this research will provide a way to cure other diseases.

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