Cancer Virus

Cancer Virus: The story of Epstein-Barr Virus [Format Kindle]

Author: Alan Rickinson | Language: English | ISBN: B00HWWPAYK | Format: PDF, EPUB

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Cancer Virus: The story of Epstein-Barr Virus
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Revue de presse

[A] pithy, pacy study. (Nature)

It reads like a thriller ... the book is compelling and colourful, capturing the romance of scientific discovery so well that it is exciting and accessible. (Linda Geddes, New Scientist)

Présentation de l'éditeur

The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) was discovered in 1964. At the time, the very idea of a virus underlying a cancer was revolutionary. Cancer is, after all, not catching. Even now, the idea of a virus causing cancer surprises many people. But Epstein-Barr, named after its discoverers, Sir Anthony Epstein and Dr Yvonne Barr, is fascinating for other reasons too. Almost everyone carries it, yet it is only under certain circumstances that it produces disease. It has been associated with
different, apparently unrelated, diseases in different populations: Burkitt's Lymphoma, producing tumours in the jaw, in African children; a nasal tumour in China; glandular fever in Europe and the USA; and the majority of cases of Hodgkin's Disease everywhere.

This book tells the story of the discovery of the virus, and the recognition of its connection with these various diseases - an account that spans the world and involves some remarkable characters and individual stories.

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Détails sur le produit

• Format : Format Kindle
• Taille du fichier : 2437 KB
• Nombre de pages de l'édition imprimée : 256 pages
• Editeur : OUP Oxford; àdition : 1 (17 janvier 2014)
• Vendu par : Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
  
• Langue : Anglais
• ASIN: B00HWWPAYK
• Synthèse vocale : Activée
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If you like detective work at the science level, this is a book for you. How do you track down a malicious piece of code (virus), find out how it causes cancers, and then stop it? Some of the answers lie in this narrative, but not all of course.

You need either a great memory, or a background in medicine to follow all the steps involved. If not, you will have to refer to previous chapters for review. Endnotes are a weakness. Who wants to stop reading a page, place a bookmark, go to the end of the book and check the notes and then return? Footnotes would have been much better.

Viruses are among the most amazing biological creations on the planet. Not life in the normal sense, but just bits of code bound on destroying their host. They have an amazing bag of tricks for doing so, which is discussed in the book. They are very similar to digital viruses that depend on the host program for their existence, and similarly have nothing but malign intent. That's why they are named viruses in the digital world! But if digital viruses like Stuxnet have been described as way beyond rocket science, then biological viruses like Epstein-Barr are Stuxnet a thousand years from now.

Towards the end of the work the authors make a strange apology: "these restricted forms have not been devised for the malevolent purpose of causing disease." (p.177). This implies that Nature is just Nature and means no harm. Hogwash! When one gets into the realm of purpose, one enters the supernatural. Some theoretical physicists conjecture that there is a two dimensional programming source at the edge of our universe (there could be more universes), that programs what goes on inside our universe. If so, then the programming for viruses is much closer to malignant that benign. Maybe the Matrix has it right. In any event, viruses are just strings of malignant code that cause such horrors as rabies, AIDS, the cancers mentioned in the book, and even the every day cold. They are not alive in the normal sense, so we need have no pity on them. The sooner they are eradicated, the better....

Par Joseph L. Famulary
- Publié sur Amazon.com

While taking a course in immunology, I became interested in viruses and bacteria that hijack our immune systems, in essence getting a free ride from the very cells that are tasked with protecting our bodies from foreign pathogens and damaged 'self' cells. A well-known example of a virus that hides in and eventually destroys our immune system is HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) which targets Helper T cells. I learned from this book that the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), which is one of the most common viral infections in humans, attacks our B lymphocytes, and under certain circumstances, our T lymphocytes and our NK (Natural Killer) cells.

"Cancer Virus" takes its reader on a tour of the many different types of cancer caused by EBV, beginning in Africa with Burkitt Lymphoma, which was the first cancer to be identified as originating from this protean virus. According to the authors, it is still not entirely clear why Burkitt Lymphoma most commonly occurs in children living in the malarial regions of the world, e.g. equatorial Africa and Papua New Guinea, but it is believed that chronic malaria reduces resistance to EBV, allowing it to take hold in the body's B lymphocytes. Burkitt himself "found a close association between this high intensity of malaria and high tumour incidence. Moreover, the peak age incidence for the tumour coincided with the age at which the children had the highest levels of malaria parasites in their blood."

The task of proving that EBV could infect normal B lymphocytes and transform them into malignant cells takes up most of the rest of this book, and the authors provide a fascinating glimpse into the microbiology, genetics, and epidemiology that it took to pin down the problems caused by this herpes virus. There were many unexpected twists and turns in the scientific journey. Another type of cancer, Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) was linked to EBV in South East Asia. It was beginning to become obvious that human genetic differences had a role to play in the incidence of the various cancers caused by EBV, and also for the rare cases of fatal infectious mononucleosis.

No vaccine against EBV had been developed at the time this book went to print in 2014, although some candidates had reached the testing stage. "To date, experts are still divided on the best approach to producing an EBV vaccine and many questions remain..." However, "...the discovery of EBV in Burkitt Lymphoma marked the birth of a new field of investigation, that of human tumor virology, which has since grown to become one of the most important aspects of modern cancer research." The publication of the EBV genome sequence resulted in many different research projects, but the functions of the virus' 80 or so genes are still not completely understood.

"Cancer Virus" helps its readers make sense of EBV and its many manifestations, most especially its role as a tumor virus. On a more personal note, one of my college suite-mates came down with mononucleosis, which I now realize probably meant that she hadn't been exposed to this virus as a child. The other three of us probably had been, and we remained healthy. That's just one of the facts I learned from this fascinating book. The authors also stress that there is still a lot to learn about EBV.

Par E. A. Lovitt
- Publié sur Amazon.com

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