Biology 1001A Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Hiv, Mobile Genetic Elements, Antiviral Drug
Document Summary
Bio 1001a - lecture 2 - evolution in action: human immunodeficiency virus. Viruses are not living organisms: do not reproduce or metabolize without host cell, but they do evolve. Unlike organisms on phylogenetic tree, viruses placed in virosphere in taxonomy: grouped in families, but links are unknown. Single or multiple origins of viruses: we don"t know. Why it is harder to design safe anti-viral drugs than antibiotics: Hiv retrovirus has rna genome so it needs to perform reverse transcription from rna to dna: disobeys central dogma of dna rna protein, dna is inserted into host cell"s chromosome. Reverse transcription has no proof-reading, therefore high mutation rates: 50% of daughter virions have at least one nucleotide different than parent virion, hiv evolves much faster than others, harder to create drug for. Hiv has three unique enzymes: reverse transcriptase, protease, and integrase.
