Is There A Way To Fool The Virus?......

[global1]

Humans are the 'host' cell that the virus attacks. It could make a person sick; it could kill a person and it replicates in the person and spreads.

My question: Is there some way an 'artificial host' cell be created that the virus could attack and somehow be trapped or someway shut off from replicating and spreading? Essentially fooling the virus.

I keep thinking that someone will discover some rather obvious or simple way to kill this virus and stop the spread. That's the Pollyanna in me.

I'm encouraging scientists and others to 'think outside the box'. Open up your minds to find a way to stop feeding the virus or maybe overfeeding the virus that would cause the virus to render itself ineffective.

This is just one of those things that is going through my mind as I sit here sheltered in my home. It's a way to keep my mind occupied and minimize the 'cabin fever' we're having to deal with.

[Eliot Rosewater]

1. Has this been done with any other virus?

I wont let anyone forget how we got here.

R U M P firing the team, refusing to act...

[LisaL]

7. Of course not.

[doc03]

2. Is that the COVID19 virus or the

one in the Whitehouse?

[Mike 03]

3. Keep throwing out ideas. I love posts like this, they get me thinking

too.

We know one of the first things this virus does it cut off a layer of oil and fat to hide inside of.

This sounds ridiculous, but if you could somehow coat your mucous membranes in some fake layer, baiting the virus to take root in something that looked like "you" but wasn't really "you", if you thought you'd been exposed you could then discard or destroy the fake layer (maybe by spraying something in your nose and mouth). Like that sticky paper some people use to trap flies.

A person could use the fake layers only when going into high risk situations, like shopping or crowds. Then tear it off or out of your membranes (or neutralize it with a spray) when you get home.

[LisaL]

6. Hmm. It's called PPE.

You use it, then you take it off and dispose of.Gloves, face masks, face shields, disposable gowns, hazmat suits.
If you can get your hands on it.

[Amishman]

4. its a matter of scale

a single cough can have 200 million viruses in it

https://www.livescience.com/3686-gross-science-cough-sneeze.html

To create something able to capture that many viruses, it would also need to be self replicating - which would take a very long time to create and could be dangerous itself

[struggle4progress]

5. A virus infects by just accidentally bumping into a cell and then injecting its nucleic acids

You should think of them as little specialized chemical programs that hijack some of a cell's machinery and use it to churn out more copies of the virus

Viruses don't eat: loose copies usually degrade rather quickly in the environment

[global1]

8. My Reference To Feeding Or Overfeeding The Virus Was Really To Try To Simplify....

the concept of creating an 'artificial host' that the virus would attach itself to. Such an 'artificial host' would not be subject to getting sick; die or allow the virus to replicate and spread.

I'm thinking along the lines of a mouse trap that catches the mouse (i.e., glue trap; etc) and entraps it so that it can't get out and create more little mice. Ultimately it would kill the mouse by cutting it off from existence.

[LisaL]

12. I am really confused as to what you think could be this artificial host.

[struggle4progress]

13. You mean, like personal protective equipment? Masks and hospital gowns, say?

[LudwigPastorius]

14. That would require nano-scale engineering and tools which don't exist yet, and are many years away.

A vaccine will be developed before such a "mousetrap".

[tavernier]

9. The other day I was thinking about the fact that insects won't go near artificial sweetener.

Made me wonder if there was some element that could repel a virus. Sadly I’m not a scientist, chemist, research biologist, nor did I have an uncle who was a doctor, lol, so I can’t begin to answer my own questions. But it’s fun to speculate.

[LisaL]

10. Well clearly Trump personally figured out how to repel the virus.

[global1]

11. That's The Kind Of Thinking I Was Hoping To Encourage By My Original Post......

keep it up. Thanks!!!!

[tavernier]

15. Rump lives on crap and diet coke

Maybe that’s why he’s not positive (IF that’s true!)

[drray23]

16. Well, is it an educated guess?

Science is not done by throwing random ideas on the wall and questioning why nobody ever thought of it unless you are yourself an expert. In which case, it becomes an educated guess.

I see this all the time in other areas of science like climate change. People think they know better than scientists and that somehow they just figured out something that the experts miss. Highly unlikely.

[cayugafalls]

17. Think of the virus as a sticky ball toy.

You've seen them. Basically a ball with suction cups around it so it will stick to things. It is not 'smart' in any way at all. But it sticks if it hits something.

That is why PPE works. It sticks to the PPE and not you and then gets discarded.

I am not a doctor but from what I understand, what we need is a way to break the bond of the sticky ball toy in our own body. That is what the antibodies essentially do. They destroy the virus and break the bond. The body fights the virus and depending on viral load, either wins or succumbs. This is why they are considering transfusion of plasma from patients who have recovered so they can add antibodies to the host to help overcome the viral load.

The virus is stupid. It is not evil per say and does not attack you. You merely get in the way and offer yourself up as host.

Keep having hope. People are working really hard to develop a vaccine.

Stay well and keep thinking positive thoughts!