New Virus Found in Russian Tundra

I found this interesting article on the Economist, and thought I’d share. A group of virus-hunting scientists thawed a 32,000-year-old slab of Siberian permafrost and discovered a virus that infects a species of amoeba. While an average virus has 9,000 bases, this virus (named Mimivirus) has more than 1m bases in its genome. It is also huge physically – 600 nm across. Scientists claim that even though this virus is enormous, it is not very dangerous to people/humans. The full article link is- http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21598612-exotic-giant-virus-thawed-russian-tundra-siberia-strain

One thought on “New Virus Found in Russian Tundra

  1. Carter

    This is so crazy!!!!! A virus that is 600 nanometers across. That is huge. I like what the article said when it described the virus as “truly weird.” Lets hope some of these giant viruses don’t infect humans.

    Reply

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