Recomendado pela AMICOR Maria Inês Reinert Azambuja
The viral universe
Viruses have big impacts
on ecology and evolution
as well as human health
They are ubiquitous, diverse and very powerful
I The outsiders inside
Humans are lucky to live a hundred years. Oak trees may live a thousand;
mayflies, in their adult form, a single day. But they are all alive in the same way.
They are made up of cells which embody flows of energy and stores of information.
Their metabolisms make use of that energy, be it from sunlight or food, to build new
molecules and break down old ones, using mechanisms described in the genes they i
nherited and may, or may not, pass on.
It is this endlessly repeated, never quite perfect reproduction which explains why oak
trees, humans, and every other plant, fungus or single-celled organism you have ever
seen or felt the presence of are all alive in the same way. It is the most fundamental
of all family resemblances. Go far enough up any creature’s family tree and you will
find an ancestor that sits in your family tree, too. Travel further and you will find what
scientists call the last universal common ancestor, luca. It was not the first living thing.
But it was the one which set the template for the life that exists today./.../
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