By Staff
July 4th, 2020
BURLINGTON, ON
There is some absolutely fascinating graphic material on the novel coronavirus and the COVID-19 disease it causes on the Scientific American web site.
Those orange spikes are what penetrate our skin and replicate what you see on the screen. Science at its best
If this is what e-learning is about – the high school students have an impressive educational opportunity ahead of them.
Very few science teachers could add much to this material. Most of them would be learning it for the first time.
While what we are experiencing is lock downs and rules that make life awkward and limited the world is seeing some of the most dramatic, fascinating and world changing advances in science.
This stuff makes the landing on the moon almost peanuts.
It is part of a race against a disease that we don’t yet fully understand that could mean the end of western civilization as we know it.
Economies are being destroyed as we watch a once great democracy stumble with no assurance that it is going to be able to get back up on its feet.
Scientists have generated an incredible amount of fine-grained knowledge in a surprisingly short time.
Parts of the graphic are in 3D
In the graphics that follow, Scientific American presents detailed explanations, current as of mid-June, into how SARS-CoV-2 sneaks inside human cells, makes copies of itself and bursts out to infiltrate many more cells, widening infection.
We show how the immune system would normally attempt to neutralize virus particles and how CoV-2 can block that effort. We explain some of the virus’s surprising abilities, such as its capacity to proofread new virus copies as they are being made to prevent mutations that could destroy them.
You can interact with the graphic – turning the image on its side or zooming in. There are numbers that you can click on for additional information.
And we show how drugs and vaccines might still be able to overcome the intruders. As virologists learn more, we will update these graphics on our Web site (www.scientificamerican.com).
A SARS-CoV-2 virus particle wafting into a person’s nose or mouth is about 100 nanometers in diameter–visible only with an electron microscope. It is a near sphere of protein (cross section shown) inside a fatty membrane that protects a twisting strand of RNA–a molecule that holds the virus’s genetic code.
The graphics are brilliant – parts are shown in 3D giving you an amazing understanding of a disease that is hammering people around the world. More than 10 million infected. Millions have died.
Proteins called “S” form spikes that extend from the surface and grab onto a human cell, hundreds of times larger, so the particle, or virion, can slip inside; the crown, or corona, appearance gives the virus its name. Structural proteins–N, M and E–move inside the cell, where they help new virions form.
A SARS-CoV-2 particle enters a person’s nose or mouth and floats in the airway until it brushes against a lung cell that has an ACE2 receptor on the surface. The virus binds to that cell, slips inside and uses the cell’s machinery to help make copies of itself. They break out, leaving the cell for dead, and penetrate other cells.
You can play with the interactive graphic – zoom in and see what the different parts of the virus are about.
Bookmark this link – and if there are science students in the house – make sure they are at least aware of this.
Distribute it widely.
Graphic shows how the virus get into a lung. The material has a time line that sets out how long it takes the virus to penetrate (minutes) and how long it takes to replicates 10 hours.
A link to the graphics is HERE
