ULTIMATE COMPUTING - Quantum Consciousness Studies

188 Viruses/Ambiguous Life Forms
animate to inanimate material, and that viruses are somewhere in the middle.
Some vital characteristics of living things include locomotion, nutrition, growth,
respiration, excretion, sensitivity and reproduction. By these criteria viruses are
not alive, however “inanimate” materials like crystals do manifest life-like
growth, nutrition, reproduction, and locomotion. Defining life by the apparent
ability to defy the second law of thermodynamics (creating order from disorder)
by assembling complex organized biological structure from the disordered
nonliving world ignores the fact that the thermodynamic law remains inviolate
overall. Molecular level cytoskeletal protein subunits or viral particles assemble
into more highly ordered structures, however the hydrophobic exclusion of water
from protein subunits counteracts the change in entropy and the net effect remains
order proceeding to disorder.
There are three general theories as to the origin of viruses (Scott, 1985). The
first is that viruses originated very early in evolution before the advent of
eukaryotic cells. According to this view, modern viruses are direct descendants of
primitive early molecules floating in the primordial soup or mud (Chapter 3). The
second idea is that they are derived from parasites which invaded other cells and
gradually became simpler, de-evolving to be totally concerned only with survival
and multiplication. The third notion, which dominates current beliefs, is that
viruses evolved from genetic material of cellular life: the “escaped gene”
hypothesis.
9.5 Domesticated Viruses
The capabilities of viruses may be harnessed (Scott, 1985). Two hundred
years ago Edward Jenner began to develop safe and effective anti-viral vaccines, a
technique which amplifies the body’s immune system. Slopek and co-workers
(1983) have treated patients afflicted with drug resistant bacterial infection by
using viral bacteriophages selected for their effectiveness against the resistant
organism. British scientists (Williams, Smith and Huggins, 1983) have used
bacteriophages to treat intestinal infections in animals and direct use of viruses to
combat bacterial infections in humans have also been attempted. Bacteriophages
have potential advantages over modern drugs: they are highly specific, can leave
the host cells unharmed with minimal side effects, and could be produced
inexpensively. However, bacteria could develop resistances to bacteriophages as
they do to some drugs.
Other researchers have used exploited viruses to mass produce natural
proteins in “genetic engineering.” For example, the “Epstein-Barr” virus has been
used to transform selected immune cells which then multiply and produce large
quantities of specific antibodies useful in medicine and industry. In some cases
viruses are changed into novel forms for use as live vaccines. Genes for influenza
and hepatitis B organisms can be combined in a vaccine virus genome to protect
us against diseases such as hepatitis B and the flu. Genes encoding proteins of
parasites such as the protozoan that causes malaria are being added to suitable
viral genomes (Smith, 1984). Viruses can transfer foreign genes into bacterial
cells. Gene coding for any wanted protein can be linked up to the genetic material
of a virus and, when the virus infects suitable bacterial cells, the foreign gene is
carried in with it. Once inside, the transferred gene may then begin to direct the
manufacture of plentiful supplies of the protein it codes for. Viruses are thus
being turned into versatile ferrymen which can carry a whole range of proteins
into humans and livestock.
Other exciting possibilities include transferring new genes into human cells.
Many research groups including Richard Mulligan and cohorts at MIT (Kolata, et
al., 1984) are trying to construct viruses that will carry new genes to human cells