Research results published last week in the medical journal Blood indicated [a discovery by Johns Hopkins scientists] could lead to a vaccine against the [AIDS] virus, which affected about 33.3 million people worldwide at the end of 2009.Scientists said their new method works by eliminating a membrane of cholesterol used by HIV to disguise itself and disarm the immune system. It steals the cholesterol from the first immune response to its intrusion, then uses it to communicate with the rest of the immune system.
By stripping it of that essential cholesterol membrane, the AIDS virus is attacked by the immune system and shut down.
Aside from being good news, I find pathogen and gene behavior incredibly fascinating. The mechanisms by which viruses function and all manner of pathogens reproduce are truly amazing.
And that leads me to my prime theory: humankind is either a pathogenic or decay organism on the planet. I’m leaning toward pathogenic, but either way, our presence is evidence that the planet, like all living organisms in this universe, is dying - unless it can shake off the infection or sever or compartmentalize the rotting organ/s. I doubt that it can do the latter since we are so widespread, but if the earth’s immune system is strong enough, it could still stage a counter-attack.
Then again, there’s a good possibility that we’re simply decay organisms, and there was an injury in the earth’s past onto which we attached ourselves and proceeded to spread rot. Man’s origins have been traced to Africa. Where was that speculated asteroid strike that may have wiped out the dinosaurs? Just Googled: Chicxulub, Mexico – so unless they revise the origins of man location, or discover that another great injury befell the earth in East Africa, the decay organism theory still looks less likely than the pathogen one.
I wonder if the earth produced offspring in its prime.
If someone would just pay me enough to speculate about large mysteries, I would quit my day job in a heartbeat.
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