mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) (11/12/89)
A couple years ago, a researcher at UCSF claimed that certain diseases, including scrapie and Creuzfeldt-Jakob syndrome, were caused by an infective agent he called "prions". Prions are said to be like viruses, but are composed of protein only, no RNA or DNA. If true, this seems to me to be one of the most important discoveries of the decade. Yet, I've heard almost nothing on this topic since SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN published an article. What is the current status of prions? Has the theory been discredited or what?
BCHS1B@jane.uh.edu (11/13/89)
In article <23936@cup.portal.com>, mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) writes: > A couple years ago, a researcher at UCSF claimed that certain diseases, > including scrapie and Creuzfeldt-Jakob syndrome, were caused by an > infective agent he called "prions". Prions are said to be like viruses, > but are composed of protein only, no RNA or DNA. > > If true, this seems to me to be one of the most important discoveries > of the decade. Yet, I've heard almost nothing on this topic since > SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN published an article. What is the current status > of prions? Has the theory been discredited or what? Although I am not fully update on prions I've read some journal articles other than SciAm. The theory has not been discredited, to the contrary many people are interested in this problem. The most recent work I read identified the protein comprising the prion as actually being a normal cellular protein whose expression has somewhat gone haywire. The route of infectivity was not clear to me, but they are still working on it. MIke Benedik Biochemical Sciences University of Houston
dmark@acsu.Buffalo.EDU (David Mark) (11/13/89)
In article <23936@cup.portal.com> mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) writes: >SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN published an article. What is the current status >of prions? Has the theory been discredited or what? Just a comment on the name. The name "Prion" is unfortunate, since that is the common English name of a group of southern hemisphere pelagic birds, related to petrels. "Prions" are also know as "whale-birds", and apparently used to hang arong whales and eat the krill and other plankton that the whales injure or otherwise stir up. David Mark dmark@cs.buffalo.edu