This virus evolves and mutates

Researchers at Michigan State University have successfully demonstrated how a new virus is capable of evolving and mutating.

In the current issue of Science, the researchers showed – for the first time – how a virus known as “Lambda” evolved to find a new way to attack host cells, which ultimately took four mutations to accomplish.



This virus infects bacteria, specifically, the common E. coli bacterium. Although Lambda isn’t dangerous to humans, the new research highlights how viruses are capable of evolving complex and potentially deadly new traits.



“We were surprised at first to see Lambda evolve this new function, this ability to attack and enter the cell through a new receptor – and it happened so fast,” explained MSU graduate student Justin Meyer.  

”But when we re-ran the evolution experiment, we saw the same thing happen over and over.”



Meyer noted that the publication of his paper, co-authored with Professor Richard Lenski, follows recent news that scientists in the United States and the Netherlands managed to produce a deadly version of bird flu.

Even though bird flu is a mere five mutations away from becoming transmissible between humans, it’s highly unlikely the virus could naturally obtain all of the beneficial mutations all at once. Nevertheless, it might evolve sequentially, gaining benefits one-by-one, if conditions are favorable at each step.

Indeed, Meyer’s “Lambda” research implies that adap……………. continues on TG Daily

NASA’s prolific planet-hunting spacecraft has hit the jackpot again, discovering 11 new planetary systems with 26 confirmed alien planets among them. 

The findings nearly double the number of bona fide planets found outside our solar system by the Kepler space observatory.

“Prior to the Kepler mission, we knew of perhaps 500 exoplanets across the whole sky,” Doug Hudgins, Kepler program scientist at NASA headquarters in Washington, said in a statement. “Now, in just two years staring at a patch of sky not much bigger than your fist, Kepler has discovered more than 60 planets and more than 2,300 planet candidates. This tells us that our galaxy is positively loaded with planets of all sizes and orbits.”

The newly detected worlds vary in size from 1.5 times the radius of Earth to larger than Jupiter; 15 of the 26 planets fall between Earth and Neptune in size. While all of the planets tightly orbit their parent stars, more research will be required to determine which worlds are rocky like Earth, and which have thick, gaseous atmospheres like Neptune, the scientists said.

Still, all of the 26 new planets orbit closer to their stars than Venus does to our sun. This means th……………. continues on Fox News