Category: Uncategorized

SO ENDS this second weekend focused on the impact of viral gene editing of their host genomes and the contribution of this to speciation in many lineages. This puts viruses at the forefront of evolutionary drivers. But such a paradigm shift will take decades more to filter down to general acceptance. We still live in an era where the debate as to whether viruses can be thought of alive or not is an active discussion. Science vigorously resists paradigm shifts. View in LinkedIn

RNA WORLD VIEW. “From the early RNA-world perspective, the whole diversity of processes within and between evolutionarily later-derived cellular life depends on various RNAs.” https://lnkd.in/e3YfQQZ View in LinkedIn

INTERACTING GENOMES. “Without living and interacting organisms and cells, genomic creativity would only be a possibility that is restricted to mere RNA combinatorial events (in an early pre-cellular RNA world), which has no relevance to the generation of a biosphere.” https://lnkd.in/e3YfQQZ View in LinkedIn

VIRAL EDITS. “Persistent viruses and virus-like agents do natural genome editing.” https://lnkd.in/e3YfQQZ View in LinkedIn

DIVERSITY. “This viral genetic text-editing competence depends on living organisms that are different from each other, and it therefore needs a biotic matrix to expand this competence.” https://lnkd.in/e3YfQQZ View in LinkedIn

VIRAL HOST EDITING SYSTEMS. “There are ”linguistic“ competences of viruses and virus-derived viral parts (e.g. env, gag, pol), which not only regulate all cellular processes, but edit the genetic content of living organisms.” https://lnkd.in/e3YfQQZ View in LinkedIn

VIRAL-DRIVEN SPECIATION. “Most evolutionarily novel derived species are the result of changed and expanded genomic identities caused by persistent viral colonization.” https://lnkd.in/e3YfQQZ View in LinkedIn

ADDICTION MOLECULES. “We can identify viral-derived addiction modules in every toxin/antitoxin, restriction/modification or insertion/deletion modules in which former competing viral clouds are now immunologically balanced.” https://lnkd.in/e3YfQQZ View in LinkedIn