This book guides through the fascinating world of viruses and makes readers enjoy science in an accessible way. Virologist and author Professor Van Wilson imparts knowledge about what viruses are, how they work, and how much they impact life on Earth. The book equips the reader with the scientific basics behind virus function and presents the historic milestones of virus research and discovery. Well-known viruses such as HIV or Influenza are tackled alongside novel pathogens like coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. Professor Wilson explores where they come from and how they impact our society.
Last but not least the book provides exciting insights into how our immune system reacts to different viruses and how vaccines contribute to conquer pandemics. While scientifically informative, this book makes the field of virology understandable to a lay audience and encourages readers to further thinking. And more importantly, it conveys the wonder, beauty, and mystery of these ubiquitous, microscopic marvels.
This book addresses anyone interested in understanding the principles of virology, viral diseases, or the impact of viruses on human societies.
Author(s): Van G. Wilson
Publisher: Springer
Year: 2022
Language: English
Pages: 358
City: Cham
Preface
Acknowledgment
Contents
List of Figures
1: The Question of Life
Weird Facts and Big Numbers
From Ignorance to Fascination
A Biological Primer – Multicellular Organisms
Smaller, But Still Alive – Unicellular Organisms
Biochemistry – You Can’t Escape It
Viruses At Last
Additional Reading
2: Families, Forms, and Functions
Taxonomy and Other Geeky Things
Virions, the Viral Vehicle
Alive or Not, Viruses Have a Life Cycle
Infection and Disease-How Viruses Spread and Do Nasty Things
Additional Reading
3: Ancient or New – On the Origin of Viruses
We Don’t Know Exactly Where We Came From, But We’re Here Anyway
Are Viruses the Chicken or the Egg?
Hypotheses, Hypotheses, and More Hypotheses
New Data at Last
Closer to Home
Papillomaviruses and Hominid Evolution
Additional Reading
4: Of Predators and Prey
Viral Infections – The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Influenza – More Than Just Bad Air
Hepatitis C – The Great Deceiver
Herpes Varicella-Zoster Virus – Now You See It, Now You Don’t
Polyomaviruses and Anelloviruses – Predators or Passengers?
Additional Reading
5: Immunity, Immunity, Immunity
The Big Three
Intrinsic Immunity – Always There When We Need It
Innate Immunity – Locked and Loaded
Adaptive Immunity – The Gift That Keeps on Giving
Additional Reading
6: Viruses That Shaped Our World
Smallpox – Mankind’s First Viral Conquest
Polio – A Force for Change
HIV/AIDS – A New Pandemic for the Twentieth Century and Beyond
Additional Reading
7: SV40 – An Obscure Monkey Virus and the Golden Age of Molecular Biology
Viruses, Viruses, and More Viruses
Polio Vaccines and A Stealth Simian Virus
To Be or Not To Be – Is SV40 a Human Tumor Virus?
The SV40 Revolution
p53 – The Guardian of the Genome
Asilomar and the Birth of Biosafety
Additional Reading
8: Viral Cancer
The Infectious Beginnings of Cancer Research
The Oncogene Revelation
Human Retroviruses at Last
Herpesviruses Turn Oncogenic
Hepatitis Viruses and Hepatocellular Carcinoma
Human Papillomaviruses – Cancer as an STD
Merkel Polyomavirus – Finally an Oncogenic Human Polyomavirus
The Seven Deadly Cancer Viruses
Additional Reading
9: The Viruses Within – How Human Are We?
Adam and EVEs
HERVs, HERVs, and More HERVs
Beyond HERVs
Assailants or Allies?
The HERVs That Made Us Human
The Dark Side
Additional Reading
10: Vaccines and the Conquest of Viruses
The Era of Vaccines
Vaccinology 101
The Road Is Long with Many a Winding Turn
Anti-Vaxxers: The Force Awakens
Vaccine Technology – A Glimpse of the Future
Additional Reading
11: New and Emerging Viruses
One Planet, Many Viruses, Countless Opportunities for Infections
The Unique Role of Bats
The Virus-Host Interface
Once and Future Threats: Influenza and Coronaviruses
Additional Reading
12: Beyond Antibiotics – Are Phages Our Allies?
From Fact to Fiction
A Brief History of Phage Therapy
A Phage Primer
The Antibiotic Problem
Phage Therapy Redux
A Glimpse of the Future
Additional Reading
13: Viruses in Gene Therapy and Cancer Therapeutics
Gene Therapy Emerges
From Adversary to Deliveryman – Harnessing Retroviruses for Gene Therapy
Into The Fray – What Other Viruses Bring to Gene Therapy
Oncolytic Viruses – Pitting One Killer Against Another
Additional Reading
Epilogue
Index
