TWiV 172: Two can be as bad as one

February 26, 2012

tetramer stainingHosts: Vincent Racaniello and Kathy Spindler

Vincent and Kathy discuss how a virus may cause disease distant from its replication site, then review a day in the life of a senior microbiology professor.

Click the arrow above to play, or right-click to download TWiV 172 (74 MB .mp3, 102 minutes).

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Weekly Science Picks

Kathy – Science prize for inquiry-based instruction (Alberts editorial, second winner)
Vincent – The long and winding road to a Ph.D.

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GregCorrelation

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6 comments on “TWiV 172: Two can be as bad as one

  1. Sizun Feb 26, 2012

    Great pick of the week vinc!

  2. Very interesting point about mumps, one I don’t think I’ve seen anyone consider in the literature. We’ve always really come at it from the point of the virus as some strains are thought to be more neurovirulent than others but nobody is really certain as to why this is the case. The virus certainly has no trouble entering your CNS – the figure of 50% you quoted is probably the upper limit though (lower limit is 4%). But lots of other people have gone back and tried to repeat that work buts it’s very difficult to do a lumbar puncture on children for something like mumps so it could even be an underestimate.

    These adverse events (meningitis [<15%] and encephalitis [<0.5%]) usual happen in adults more so than kids and more often in males than females. So if it were to have a 'polymicrobial' aspect it would have to take into consideration these points. I'm all for trying it though!

  3. Michaelvanderploeg Feb 29, 2012

    very informative from one who lives with ME Thanks

  4. Tony Mach Mar 5, 2012

    “I have it in my car, my dashboard set on Celsius and it drives everybody crazy.”

    I have my car set to Celsius too. What are the alternatives? Kelvin?

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    (Just a euro-centric joke of mine… 

    Which reminds me:
    Professor: “… and the temperature on the sun is 1 Million degrees.”
    Student: “Celsius or Kelvin?”)

    • If I could set the car dash readout to Kelvin I would, just to drive everyone even more crazy.