Viruses have a special place at the Loom--they're ubiquitous and have some pretty profound influences on the evolution of their hosts (including us). But a French scientist named Patrick Forterre wants to take it up a notch. He's arguing that our very DNA is the creation of viruses some four billion years ago. It's a controversial idea, but one that other scientists are definitely taking seriously. I've got the full story is here in today's issue of Science, and here on my web site. For gorey details, see The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences for a paper by Forterre that surveys the scenario and the evidence it's built on.
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In the Beginning Were the Viruses
Category: Evolution
Posted on: May 11, 2006 5:37 PM, by Carl Zimmer
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Five Easy Questions: Stephen DarkSyde, Part One from ThePublishingSpot
Stephen DarkSyde is a freelance science writer with one of the most exciting gigs in the world, writing political and science-oriented columns over at Daily Kos. In an email interview, DarkSyde explained his job at this popular blog in... Read More
Tracked on May 15, 2006 4:21 PM
Comments
Fascinating ideas.
Is there anything out there that gives a better description of that high error rate? How do RNA viruses work, given that?
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 11, 2006 8:37 PM
Owlmirror--RNA viruses are small, avoiding the dangers of big error-ridden genomes. For more from Penny, download this pdf: http://awcmee.massey.ac.nz/people/dpenny/pdf/Poole_et_al_1999.pdf
Posted by: Carl Zimmer | May 12, 2006 12:36 AM
Great summary. Your blog makes goofing off at work truly rewarding. Keep up the good work.
Posted by: msf | May 12, 2006 9:27 AM
I'll second the "goofing off" comment!
As to the original write-up, just wow, Carl. Science is infitely more interesting than the anti-science "alternatives."
Posted by: Steviepinhead | May 12, 2006 1:05 PM
Hmm. Let's try "infinitely" in the comment just above!
Posted by: Steviepinhead | May 13, 2006 11:28 AM
Could you give us a paragraph or so on "most of the biomass in the oceans are made up of viruses"? That is amazing!
Posted by: lee | May 14, 2006 4:10 PM
I don't think that's right. Phage are the most abundant by number, outnumbering bacteria in the oceans by at least 10:1, but I don't think they're so abundant as to exceed the mass of their bacterial prey.
Phage may affect the fate of the majority of the biomass in the oceants - on average, I'm told, bacteria are killed by phage about as often as they divide.
Posted by: Jim Hu | May 14, 2006 10:16 PM
Ha! Here comes a nasty-looking virus! Quick, let's divide, then "you" head that way and "I"'ll head this way. That way, at least one of us can get away!
Posted by: Steviepinhead | May 15, 2006 2:22 PM
original link: http://www.uib.no/magazine/updates/Viruses/viruses.htm
google's cache: http://216.239.59.104/search?q=cache:nVBWVh0eDMcJ:www.uib.no/magazine/updates/Viruses/viruses.htm+virus+biomass+ocean&hl=en&gl=be&ct=clnk&cd=2&client=firefox-a
Posted by: luca | May 23, 2006 5:51 AM