Viruses are not life-forms themselves, because they can’t survive on their own. They must take over about the biology of viruses. Viruses are very small particles that act as cellular parasites. It’s cellular machinery in order to survive.

This chapter initially talked about factors common to all viruses, and then turned to those aspects that are particular to HIV. HIV is a member of a class of virus know as retroviruses. While most viruses use DNA as their genetic material, retroviruses use RNA Reverse transcriptase is a protein in retroviruses that copies RNA into DNA, and then helps the viral DNA integrate into the cellular chromosomes, where it will remain for the life of that infected cell.

For this discussion, choose one example of the viral biology to focus on. Choose one aspect that was unusual interesting to you. Do some research to find out a little more about it. Here is a list of examples, but you can think of other Ones as well:

a. the retrovirus life cycle

b. anti-HIV therapies

c. the ELISA “HIV test”

d. the fate of HIV infected cells

e. HIV latency

f. direct cell to cell spread of the HIV

g. how HIV kills T-cells that aren’t infected with HIV

h. If viruses aren’t alive, what motivates them to keep going on?

Each student should write up one primary post of about 150-200 words.