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40hz:
From this article over at Quanta Magazine's website:
Hints of Life’s Start Found in a Giant Virus
At more than 1.5 micrometers long, pithovirus is the largest virus ever discovered — larger even than some bacteria. Many of its 500 genes are unrelated to any other genes on this planet.
By: Carrie Arnold
July 10, 2014
Chantal Abergel and Jean-Michel Claverie were used to finding strange viruses. The married virologists at Aix-Marseille University had made a career of it. But pithovirus, which they discovered in 2013 in a sample of Siberian dirt that had been frozen for more than 30,000 years, was more bizarre than the pair had ever imagined a virus could be.
In the world of microbes, viruses are small — notoriously small. Pithovirus is not. The largest virus ever discovered, pithovirus is more massive than even some bacteria. Most viruses copy themselves by hijacking their host’s molecular machinery. But pithovirus is much more independent, possessing some replication machinery of its own. Pithovirus’s relatively large number of genes also differentiated it from other viruses, which are often genetically simple — the smallest have a mere four genes. Pithovirus has around 500 genes, and some are used for complex tasks such as making proteins and repairing and replicating DNA. “It was so different from what we were taught about viruses,” Abergel said.
The stunning find, first revealed in March, isn’t just expanding scientists’ notions of what a virus can be. It is reframing the debate over the origins of life...
--- End quote ---
What I found particularly fascinating was this paragraph:
...Abergel and Claverie, however, believe that viruses emerged from cells. While Forterre and collaborators contend that the unique genes found in giant viruses are a sign that they evolved before modern cells, Abergel and Claverie have a different explanation: Giant viruses may have evolved from a line of cells that is now extinct. According to this theory, the ancestor of giant viruses lost its ability to replicate as an independent life form and was forced to rely on other cells to copy its DNA. Pieces of these ancient cells’ genes survive in modern mimivirus, pandoravirus, and pithovirus, which would explain the unique genes found in this group. “Life didn’t have one single ancestor,” Claverie said. “There were a lot of cell-like organisms that were all competing, and there was one winner, which formed the basis for life as we know it today.”
--- End quote ---
Read the full article (and see the photos) here.
8)
superboyac:
From this article over at Quanta Magazine's website:
Hints of Life’s Start Found in a Giant Virus
At more than 1.5 micrometers long, pithovirus is the largest virus ever discovered — larger even than some bacteria. Many of its 500 genes are unrelated to any other genes on this planet.
By: Carrie Arnold
July 10, 2014
Chantal Abergel and Jean-Michel Claverie were used to finding strange viruses. The married virologists at Aix-Marseille University had made a career of it. But pithovirus, which they discovered in 2013 in a sample of Siberian dirt that had been frozen for more than 30,000 years, was more bizarre than the pair had ever imagined a virus could be.
In the world of microbes, viruses are small — notoriously small. Pithovirus is not. The largest virus ever discovered, pithovirus is more massive than even some bacteria. Most viruses copy themselves by hijacking their host’s molecular machinery. But pithovirus is much more independent, possessing some replication machinery of its own. Pithovirus’s relatively large number of genes also differentiated it from other viruses, which are often genetically simple — the smallest have a mere four genes. Pithovirus has around 500 genes, and some are used for complex tasks such as making proteins and repairing and replicating DNA. “It was so different from what we were taught about viruses,” Abergel said.
The stunning find, first revealed in March, isn’t just expanding scientists’ notions of what a virus can be. It is reframing the debate over the origins of life...
--- End quote ---
What I found particularly fascinating was this paragraph:
...Abergel and Claverie, however, believe that viruses emerged from cells. While Forterre and collaborators contend that the unique genes found in giant viruses are a sign that they evolved before modern cells, Abergel and Claverie have a different explanation: Giant viruses may have evolved from a line of cells that is now extinct. According to this theory, the ancestor of giant viruses lost its ability to replicate as an independent life form and was forced to rely on other cells to copy its DNA. Pieces of these ancient cells’ genes survive in modern mimivirus, pandoravirus, and pithovirus, which would explain the unique genes found in this group. “Life didn’t have one single ancestor,” Claverie said. “There were a lot of cell-like organisms that were all competing, and there was one winner, which formed the basis for life as we know it today.”
--- End quote ---
Read the full article (and see the photos) here.
8)
-40hz (July 31, 2014, 04:06 PM)
--- End quote ---
Fascinating!!
So maybe like dinosaurs, early viruses were huge! What is the Argentinosaurus of viruses?
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