Question

a.) Say you were able to isolate lung tissue from someone with the influenza virus, how would you amplify the viral genome to identify the sequence?

b.) The drug amantadine is able to shorten the life of influenza virus by preventing the virus from uncoating. Why would preventing the virus from uncoating shorten the length of the of the viral infection of a host cell?

c.) Describe another method by which a drug could inhibit another step in the viral replication pathway, apart from the inhibition of viral uncoating, that would do little to no harm of the host cell's normal cellular function?

d.) Would viral replication of the influenza directly require enzymes in the nucleus of the cell?

Answer 1

a. Amplification of viral genome can be done using PCR. First from the gene database the influenza virus genome sequence can be obtained then accordingly forward and reverse primer can be made and either PCR or RT PCR can be done to amplify the specific portion of the genome.

b. If the virus is prevented from uncoating the genome of the virus cannot go and integrate into the host genome and thus the Virus cannot replicate inside the host and is unable to infect the host.

c. Virus attachment to the cell can be blocked by using a drug that binds to the receptor on the surface of the host cell. This drug can act as a competitive inhibitor of the virus attachment protein and thus prevent its entry into the host.

d. First the virus uses its RNA dependent RNA polymerase which then produces complementary RNA which it uses as a complementary strand to produce more viral genome.