How come viruses have developed so many different ways to penetrate into their host cells?
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I've always envisioned viruses as being a type of "shuttle" entity, in particular an entity that mediates gene transfer. For example, viruses in the ocean could possibly be a major contributor to gene flow and the ability to "shuttle" genes between organisms is reliant on the ability of the virus to enter the cell. In the eukaryotic world we see viruses like retroviridae that incorporate themselves into host genomes or other viruses like polyoma or papilloma which perform similar activities related to transferring genes. The common element of virus propagation and establishment of this gene flow is viral entry. One can imagine that as life became more complex(multi-cellular organisms with tissue specific cells) viruses evolved more mechanisms to enter their host.
Posted by: Mark | June 12, 2012 at 05:03 PM