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His Ideas 20 ~ Information Center (1)

January 27, 2021

In the book titled, 'COVID-19 ~A Novel Coronavirus's 7 Mysteries', which was written by a specialist of immunology, the author quoted a physicist's remark, "It's easy to be afraid of something too much or not to be afraid of it at all, but it's hard to be afraid of it correctly." It reminded him of one of Sun Tzu 'The Art of War', "If you know about your enemy and yourself, you can win a hundred fights." It already had been a year or so when the coronavirus pandemic started, and vaccinations have started in some countries. But his knowledge about the virus and related scientific things is not so different from one year before. Maybe he needed to know more about the basic things about the enemy 'viruses'. So, he read some books about viruses, including this book. He began to study. What's a 'Virus'? ・Viruses have been living from billions of years ago with other creatures on the earth, and ever-evolving.   ・There seemed to be more than a hundred million kinds of viruses. In a sample of 1 c.c. of sea water there appeared to be 5 million to 15 million pieces of viruses. As there are 4 billion red blood cells in 1 c.c. of human blood, imagine how many possible viruses there are. There are 6,590 viruses on the virus list of the International Virus Classify Association. A scientist said that there are at least 320,000 kinds of unknown viruses in mammals. The number of viruses that have pathogens to harm human beings are among these. ・Viruses can't be categorized into 'creatures'. Creatures have cells. Cells can live by themselves because they can create energy by themselves, and they also can increase by themselves, it is called 'cell division'. But viruses can't create any energy themselves, and they can't increase by themselves, either. Viruses need a cell from a creature as an incubation chamber in order to multiply. Viruses are smaller than 0.1 micron (1 micron = 1/1000 millimeter) while cells are bigger than several microns. ・Viruses can be divided into two types, in two ways; one has DNA in it, the other has RNA in it. Another, one has a shell called an 'envelop', the other doesn't. DNA has 'information', some of them have genes. Genes have information to reproduce other bodies, copy themselves. RNA also has some information. RNA sometimes copies DNA's information. ・COVID-19 is a RNA - enveloped virus. The envelops are made of oil, so washing your hands with soap is effective to make the virus useless because soap dissolves oil.   How do the virus enter human bodies? ・Human bodies have some systems to protect from viruses and other pathogens. The first protector is a liquid like tears, saliva, gastric juices, and other mucous membranes that are disinfectants. The second one are white blood cells. When pathogens come in a body, they will detect it and emit infection substances, they will also eat pathogens. The third are lymphocytes. Lymphocytes vary one by one, there are hundreds of thousands of kinds of them in a human body. One type of lymphocyte will treat one counterpart pathogen. Lymphocytes are usually going around in our body, they are detectives. Once a pathogen enters, the lymphocyte which corresponds to that type will come and start to produce themselves. It will take a certain amount of time. For example, if it is influenza, normal patients take a couple of days to be cured. For this period, newly reproduced lymphocytes are battling against influenza viruses. After fighting the pathogen, the lymphocytes will memorize the pathogen, so next time if the same pathogens come, they will fight more efficiently. It's called 'antibody'. Vaccines are expected to give memories to lymphocytes to protect against the viruses. How viruses increase in a body? ・If it is a RNA virus which has an envelop, when entering, the envelop comes off and only its RNA enters. RNA is normally shaped like a long rope, the rope will separate into pieces, each piece will copy themselves and they will grow into their original bodies with the help of the RNA's information. Then, they will be emitted outside of the cell. Medicine is expected to stop the developing action at either of the stages. (To be continued ...)

No.418



*novel :新しい
*Sun Tzu 'The Art of War' :孫子の兵法
*evolve :進化する
*ever :絶えず
*red blood cell :赤血球
*mammal :哺乳類
*cell :細胞
*incubation chamber :保育器
*multiply :どんどん増やす、掛ける
*gene :遺伝子
*dissolve :溶かす
*gastric juice :胃液
*mucous membrane :粘膜
*lymphocyte :リンパ球
*correspond :応答する
*antibody :抗体