武汉大学病毒学双语版Chapter1.pptVIP

Introduction to Virology Learning Objectives: On completing this session, you should be able to: Understand what a virus is explain how viruses differ from all other organisms. Summarize the history of virology explain how the present state of our knowledge of viruses was achieved. Describe the techniques most frequently used to study viruses. Virus diversity There is more biological diversity within viruses than in all the rest of the bacterial, plant animal kingdoms put together. This results from the success of viruses in parasitizing all known groups of living organisms. Understanding this diversity is the key to comprehending the interactions of viruses with their hosts. At a molecular level, protein-protein, protein-nucleic acid, protein-lipid interactions determine the structure of virus particles, the synthesis expression of virus genomes the effects of viruses on the host cell. Viruses are distinct from living organisms Viruses are submicroscopic, obligate intracellular parasites. However, a few groups of prokaryotic organisms that have specialized intracellular parasitic life-cycles which confound the above definition - the Rickettsiae Chlamydiae - obligate intracellular parasitic bacteria which have evolved so that they can exist outside the cells of their hosts only for a short period of time before losing viability. Therefore it is necessary to add further clauses to the definition of what constitutes a virus. Virus definition: Virus particles are produced from the assembly of pre-formed components, whereas other agents grow from an increase in the integrated sum of their components reproduce by division Virus particles (virions) themselves do not grow or undergo division Viruses lack the genetic information which encodes apparatus necessary for the generation of metabolic energy or for protein synthesis (ribosomes) Viruses are energy parasites No known virus has the biochemical or genetic potential to generate the energy necessary to