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Biotech Science

Is SARS From Mars? 76

Posted by timothy from the make-of-it-what-you-will dept.
lupulack writes "A news item at CTV.ca asks whether coronaviruses such as that implicated in SARS are in fact completely terrestrial in origin. It's not as clear cut as you might think !"
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Is SARS From Mars? More

Is SARS From Mars?

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  • Tinfoil hat time (Score:5, Insightful)

    by wowbagger ( 69688 ) * on Saturday May 24, 2003 @01:05PM (#6031085) Homepage Journal
    This guy's reasoning seems to go something like this:

    "This showed up all of a sudden, we've never seen anything like it, so it must be ALIENS! "

    True, he is not suggesting that SARS is the first step of global domination by an actual extra-terrestrial intelligence, but he is saying that SARS came from a comet.

    OK, let's break out Occam's razor. (strop, strop, strop. Hmmm, good and sharp.)

    The explaination that requires the fewest ad-hoc assumptions is the most likely to be correct (as it has the fewest places to break).

    Scenario 1: SARS is ET in origin. Required ad-hoc assumptions: there are viruses in space. Those viruses can infect humans. Those viruses can survive transport on a comet or other body from their point of origin and earth. None of those assumptions have much evidence to back them up.

    Scenario 2: SARS is a naturally occuring virus that we have not seen before. Required ad-hoc assumptions: none.

    OK, kids - which of these scenarios survives Occam's Razor?
    • #3 is SARS was an experimental weapon that leaked out accidentaly. Unlike previous cootieth that hit asia, with SARS there was too much hemming and hawing and keeping it secret when it first hit. And there still is. I first read of it back in novemeber, and details-even the city involved-were very sketchy. The complexities of it also tend to suggest human manufactured.

      And apparently there's anecdotal now that the infection rate is higher than official numbers suggest, and it's being kept covered up, even i

      • Re:scenario 3 (Score:5, Insightful)

        by neden ( 228436 ) on Saturday May 24, 2003 @02:44PM (#6031620)
        The complexities of it also tend to suggest human manufactured.

        I wouldn't use complexity as any sort of argument for a human's hand in this. If anything, I would argue that complexity would point away from an artificial source and towards a natural one.

        For all our advances in understanding of molecular biology, we still know far less than we don't know, especially about protein structure and fuction. If we knew enough about that, then most diseases for which we have identified the genes involved would be cured by now. Sequencing genes is relatively easy, identifying what the gene does is harder, but figuring out exactly how the protein product of the gene actually works (and how a mutation affects that functioning) is by far the hardest.

        Human intervention in creating a virus would most likely take the form of "let's take this gene from another virus or organism and put it in this other virus". Things like that aren't too hard to identify by DNA sequence analysis (relatively simple pattern matching, after all). I'm sure after they sequenced the DNA of the virus, they started comparing it to other known sequences. (Interesting side note - I actually had a class with one of the people who sequenced the virus DNA - he was taking a few qualifying courses before starting his grad studies in molecular biology, and I was finishing my undergrad in biochemistry. It was funny to see the name and recognize the face almost 12 years later.)
        • Thanks for the input. I really can't be more specific other than I smell a rat with it. If you would like to read and comment on some detailed work (I can't, no idea what 99% of this stuff is and you sound like you do), go to rense.com, scroll to all the links about SARS, especially several of the released "world exclusive" research links, and the "whistleblower" links. There's quite a few so I won't link them all, they are easy to find there though.

          If you would like I mean, and if you are interested.
          • Sorry for taking so long to reply - had other things to do.

            I found three links in a row on the Rense website referring to the possibility of SARS being a man-made bioweapon. A lot of the information from the three links is the same, but each does contain additional information.

            one [news24.com]
            two [rense.com]
            three [rense.com]

            I don't have time to research all of the claims made in those links, but some things did stick out to me:

            They keep quoting Nikolai Filatov as saying he thinks the virus is man-made because "there is no vaccine for
            • Thanks for your detailed reply, and absolutely no problem with any delay or whatever, I just thought you might be interested in it and I was interested in your comentary.. I'm just trying to get a better handle on the whole SARs issue, so I get info from a variety of places. Most of what I have read comes from more mainstream news sources, and rense also quotes a lot of those as well. His site is great! He covers such a wide range of topics that there's something to both annoy and delite just about everyone
      • SARS is a regular virus that has mutated due to certian countries habits for housing different kinds of livestock together in the same unsanitary pens for extened periods of time? This would allow the virus many many more chances than it would normally have for cross-species mutation. Over a long enough time frame (oh 2000 years or so I guess) I guess anything is possible...

        Just a wild guess.

        Jaysyn

    • Re:Tinfoil hat time (Score:3, Informative)

      by kalidasa ( 577403 )
      I read the original Lancet letter. It's the thinnest piece of reasoning I've ever seen published in a scholarly journal. The guy is apparently some kind of viruses-from-space kook, who believes that the fact that he's found microbes 40 km up means they're coming from space.

    • Re:Tinfoil hat time (Score:3, Interesting)

      by sould ( 301844 )
      I agree completely with your reasoning.

      But

      Occam's razor is not "the explaination that requires the fewest ad-hoc assumptions is the most likely to be correct (as it has the fewest places to break)."

      Its actually "Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily."

      One of the philisophical conclusions you can take Occam's razor to is "when you have two competing theories which make exactly the same predictions, the one that is simpler is the better."

      But that aint actually the razor itself.
    • OK, let's break out Occam's razor. (strop, strop, strop. Hmmm, good and sharp.)

      This is a really pat answer but:-
      Occam was never the victim of a conspiracy :->

  • Sorry (Score:5, Insightful)

    by smoondog ( 85133 ) on Saturday May 24, 2003 @01:14PM (#6031110)
    I'm happy that science is alive and well in this world. Viruses, fortunately, are very likely not alive out of this world. I'm not even sure where these authors get off even suggesting that viruses come from outer space. Reasons:

    1. Viruses are delicate. Being in outer space, crashing to earth, and infecting someone. A difficult task by itself.

    2. Viruses evolve jointly with hosts. All evidence suggests that viruses have a very close (evolving) relationship with their hosts.

    3. There are perfectly good theories with lots of evidence that explain new virus infections. For example, SARS may have come from a little evolution by a virus in a cat-like species of civet [hinduonnet.com]. It didn't help that the viruses new host happened to be a delicacy.

    4. There may be lots of evidence that life exists outside of our planet, but (like #2) viruses require evolution from a similar host. That suggest the virus would have to get into space from earth first. That makes it extremely unlikely (IMO) that a virus could go to space get back and reinfect the same (or similar) species of host without being damaged.

    5. Finally, (AFAIK) A VIABLE VIRUS HAS NEVER BEEN FOUND/CULTURED ON A METEOR!!!!

    This theory is a little like suggesting that crop circles come from aliens even after the people who admitted building the first ones have come forward. It is possible, but very, very unlikely. (Personally, I hope that the rest of cosmological theories are attached to better evidence than this)

    -Sean

  • Nothing to see, move along (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Imperator ( 17614 ) <slashdot2@nOsPAm.omershenker.net> on Saturday May 24, 2003 @01:18PM (#6031129)

    The scientists quoted in the article don't provide a shred of evidence. They argue that it is possible that the pathogen responsible for SARS fell out of the stratosphere. They don't have any evidence to suggest it actually happened. Furthermore, they can't show any examples of living things falling from that altitude and surviving, nor can they even really provide a mechanism by which such a thing might be possible.

    We already have an explanation of where SARS and other viruses come from: mutations of other human diseases or mutations of similar animal diseases. We already have an explanation for why many of these come from China: China has a large number of people in close proximity to farm animals, and most of these people do not have good sanitation. From the plague to influenza and even HIV, we can identify the animal links by which humans first became infected. These explanations have been tested and correctly predict future results: for example, immunologists look at pigs and ducks in Hong Kong when they decide which three strains of influenza the annual flu shots should protect against.

    In contrast, a few British microbiologists are proposing that viruses fall from the stratosphere. It's certainly possible that they're right, but we're a long way from throwing out our current theories.

    • Furthermore, they can't show any examples of living things falling from that altitude and surviving Er, remember the worms surviving the shuttle crash [washingtonpost.com]? This stuff happens all the time, especially when the live organism is distanced from the outer layers of whatever it came down to Earth in. However, this is not to say that I believe their theory contains much clout. To say that virii external to Earth mutated and evolved as such that they can infect us without having had any previous contact with us is a

      • Re:Nothing to see, move along (Score:4, Informative)

        by Imperator ( 17614 ) <slashdot2@nOsPAm.omershenker.net> on Saturday May 24, 2003 @02:12PM (#6031457)
        The worms survived Columbia because they were in a human-constructed container and they got lucky. Now if they were suggesting that viruses come down in the center of meteorites, that would be a plausible mechanism. But as far as I know, they're not. (And it wouldn't make much sense--viruses that have the same mechanisms (e.g. for RNA and its replication) as just about all other life on Earth, and are well-adapted to their hosts (the products of 4 billion years of evolution) and yet are of extraterrestrial origin. The chances are slim to none, with emphasis on none.)

    • China has a large number of people in close proximity to farm animals, and most of these people do not have good sanitation.

      I suspect it's more relevant that rural Chinese live in relatively close proximity to a wide range of animals. In North America and Europe, farmers are regularly exposed to cows, sheep, goats, pigs ... a dozen animal types, perhaps. HIV/AIDS migrated from monkeys to humans, in Africa. Since China is the world's largest country with a variety of climates: southern, northern, deser

    • The scientist making these claims is demonstratably incorrect. Allow me to explain:

      were the SARS virus from space, it would be expected that it would have little relationship genetically to other viri on earth. In other words, there would be no genes in sars that are genetically similar to those found in other species. However, at the beginning of the SARS virus there is a replicase gene that is identical to one found in other viruses. If you would like to confirm this for yourself, here are some inst

  • Link to a more believable article (Score:5, Informative)

    by Andy_R ( 114137 ) on Saturday May 24, 2003 @01:27PM (#6031201) Homepage Journal
    The World Health Organisation are now saying it's likely to have originated in civet cats [who.int]

    I expect the author of the theory that 'The Lancet' printed in their letter page will now follow up with an equally believable theory that the cats flew here from Mars.
    • By the way, previously the WHO have said that cats (and cockroaches) do not spread the disease. As these animals that were tested were found/bought from a food market, it is probable that SARS originated from people eating cats.
    • Alright, it's offically gone too far. Insane eating habits are killing lots of people.

      First, don't eat carnivores. Is that so frikkin' hard to understand? Besides being cute and fluffy, they're already at the top of the food chain. Do you understand what a bioaccumulator is? No, I didn't think so. Hint: it's a really bad idea. Also, beating puppies to death and eating them just shows what a pathetic waste of air you are.

      Also, don't eat endangered species. Seriously, I'm sorry you've got a small di

      • Re:Somebody smack these people (Score:4, Informative)

        by AtomicBomb ( 173897 ) on Sunday May 25, 2003 @02:05AM (#6033988) Homepage
        The masked palm civet cat in Southern China is largely a herbivore. When I was scouting in many years ago, the rangers in Hongkong forest park taught me how to spot these animals. They leave indigested seed/fruit skin with their faeces. They are dubbed as "fruit ferret" in the local language.... Having said that, when transforming to a largely urban life, there are lots of habits that needs to be given up. Some activities make perfect sense in farming society no longer apply in industrial region... I think the consumption of wild animal is one of the example... Hunting is probably the other... Both western and oriental society need to go through these phases.... give us some time.

        [newsday.com]
        Info on Civet Cat, Found to Have SARS
        * TRAITS: Of the family Viverridae, the civet cat is a primarily nocturnal animal closely related to the mongoose. There are several species. Some are carnivores that live on the ground, while the animals with SARS in China are masked palm civets, which live in trees and eat fruit.

  • Glaicers. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Unknown Poltroon ( 31628 ) <unknown_poltroon1sp@myahoo.com> on Saturday May 24, 2003 @01:28PM (#6031206)
    I heard an interesting discussion about viruses/plagues being trapped in glaicers. AS the glacier thaws, it is reintroduced to the world, which as since lost much of its resistance. Im not sure what evidence they have, but it is a neat idea.
    • IANAB (Biologist) but that seems just as likely as the 'SARS is from Mars, Aids is from Venus theory'.

      SARS has pretty good resistance, it can exist outside of the human body for 3 or 4 days if the temperature is in the right band (which does not explain Toronto). A virus like this one would have to survive around 70 years at below freezing and then be able to cause havoc at 'normal' temperatures. A virus that powerful would either be pretty unstoppable anyway, or we would have adapted to it as in the Co
  • If you are publishing a respected medical journal, when reporting the words of a widely published doctor, it is important to check if it's this particular doctor [catinthehat.org] or not!
  • Coronavirus is from Mars, Chlamydia is from Venus.

  • Sigh... (Score:2, Informative)

    by jensend ( 71114 )
    Slashdot: News for Paranoids, Conspiracy Theorists, Pseudo-Scientists, Quacks, and Superstitious Folks: Stuff that the Establishment Wouldn't Tell You.

    I can't believe this got posted.

  • Is SARS from Mars? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Strange Ranger ( 454494 ) on Saturday May 24, 2003 @02:46PM (#6031627)

    Is your Brainus in Uranus?

  • Sceptical - or blinkered? (Score:4, Informative)

    by canthusus ( 463707 ) on Saturday May 24, 2003 @03:04PM (#6031714)
    I see a lot of scepticism about Prof. Wickramasinghe's theory! Scepticism is good, where it's informed. But some of the scepticism borders on blinkered.

    To put a couple of things straight first. Professor Wickramasinghe [cf.ac.uk] hasn't said that SARS comes from space. In the Lancet letter [thelancet.com] (free reg required), he says "With respect to the SARS outbreak, a prima facie case for a possible space incidence can already be made". Note the word "possible". Note the words "prima facie" (roughly="sufficient to warrant further investigation").

    This isn't some crackpot who's just heard of SARS, can't understand epidemiology and therefore thinks it must have come from outer space without thinking things through. Along with Fred Hoyle [cf.ac.uk], he's long been a proponent of panspermia [panspermia.org] - the theory that life originated in space, rather than on Earth.

    There is plentiful evidence of complex organic molecules in cometary and interstellar material. The environment on periodically warmed comets is every bit as suitable for the generation of life as the alternative theory of the primordial soup. Organic compounds, quite tightly concentrated, intermittent energy, water. The theory is that life on Earth originated Out There, so it would be no surprise that DNA/RNA from space would fit earthly organisms - they share the same origins.

    In his letter, Prof. Wickramasinghe estimates that "a tonne of bacterial material falls to Earth from space daily, which translates into some 10^19 bacteria, or 20 000 bacteria per square metre of the Earth's surface". It would be surprising if none of these found a viable host. On the rare occasion that there is a good match, a pandemic could result. We don't know if SARS started this way or not.

    Note that meteors aren't involved. Nothing gets burned up on re-entry. The stuff just drifts in.

    I don't know what the answer is, but I know that it's not as clear cut as some would like to think. It's just possible that data from Beagle2 this Christmas might help shed a little more light.

  • long answer: nope
  • ...The rest of this Dr. Seuss book is left as an exercise for the reader.

  • More probable theory (Score:4, Funny)

    by Alsee ( 515537 ) on Saturday May 24, 2003 @03:58PM (#6031964) Homepage
    It's more likely that the SARS virus quantum tunneled to earth through the dark matter membrane between our universe and a parallel dimension transversely embedded in subspace when intelligent negative energy beings empathicly remodulated the inverse temporal phase variance beyond the cubic Plank threshhold condensing the quark-gluon plasma into a metastable yet highly pourous and heterotropic configuration.

    -
  • The "UK scientist" is actually Dana Scully.

  • what's wrong with that... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by g4dget ( 579145 ) on Saturday May 24, 2003 @04:11PM (#6032027)
    What's wrong with that theory is not the idea that viruses and microbes may rain down onto earth from space. It still doesn't seem particularly likely, but it's possible.

    But a virus that infects human cells and evades the immune system sufficiently long to kill has to have evolved in vertebrates. So, unless the universe is filled with vertebrates and they have a habit of coughing in our general direction, that doesn't seem particularly plausible.

    More likely, the SARS virus belongs to the viruses that we have never bothered to identify before: among viruses and microbial life, we have identified and characterized only a tiny fraction so far.
  • via Mao
  • ...and I'm by now means an expert in biology, but wouldn't a virus that infects human being pretty much have to evolve and develop in the presence of human beings. I mean sure - some viruses jump from animals to humans, but we're talking creatures whose gentic structure is what? Something that has a 25-30% difference in it's gene structure.

    When was that last time you caught Dutch Elm Disease? A tree has more in common genetically with us than whatever hosts these virii developed on. What are the odds t
    • There is a form of Chicken Plague (sorry, don't know the real english name) currently causing havoc in Holland, it has also spread to the border areas of Germany.

      Apparently humans can also get it, although the effects are pretty mild. To Humans.

      Various forms of Influenza are also alleged to originate with Chickens (in China). Body temperature seems to be an important factor, but I have not seen a http://www.bushorchicken.com site so far so would suspect that the birds are not that closely related to u
      • Are chickens (or any birds) that closely related to us? Depends on your perspective. Obviously birds are going to be further from us genetically than other mammals. Likewise with other non-mammalian vetebrates.

        But they are vertebrates, and we do share some common genetic structure. Whereas these alien viruses use alien beings as hosts, and thus are attuned to alien genetic structure, which would in all likelyhood be so completely alien to human genetic structure that compared to them, chickens and huma
  • I think the aliens return from work, watch telenovels, pay the bills in their mail, wash the dishes and go to bed.
  • No, but SIDS is.
  • And people wonder why this virus seems to have jumped from the civet to humans...

    Civet coffee [nzoom.com]

  • everyone laughs at the UK. Shame on my stupid country!

  • Unlikely, say earthbound microbiologists. But some scientists from the United Kingdom aren't so sure.
    this rumor is itself from outer space!
    as the article states it came from a far place called 'United Kingdom' (probably a planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse) and NOT fom an earthbound microbiologist.

    :)
  • Now it is Mars sending viruses to Earth. I thought we are worried about Earth sending bacteria to Mars. Damn green little devils, they promised they won't do that.
  • Professors Wickramasinghe and Hoyle, leading proponents of the panspermia theory, suggested an extraterrestrial cause for the observed mutability of the influenza virus back in the 1980's. Ask Google about 'Wickramasinghe Hoyle influenza theory' for more details. My impression is that even the good professor's fellow astronomers regard him as a bit of a nutcase on this topic; I imagine that workers more familiar with the field take it as just the latest example of a tendancy among scholars of the physical s
    • My impression is that even the good professor's fellow astronomers regard him as a bit of a nutcase on this topic;

      And this of course is also key - a bit of a nutcase, sure, but not even a *biologist* with nutty views on evolution. At least they have a chance of finding a slippery grasp on biological principles with two blind grabs...
  • Instead of reasoning that diseases pop up near where the atmosphere is thinner, which seems to be giving me near-fatal bogon poisoning, why not say that diseases pop up most where health care is poorest? China, while it is developing, still has poor living conditions and restricted access to life-saving drugs. It makes perfect sense to me that SARS originated in China and not Europe or the US, just as cholera, malaria, and AIDS ravage Africa and not Europe nor the US.

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