Bird Flu Mutating!
I just got a disturbing e-mail from Dr. Kapustin from " Nature.com ". It looks like Nature is way out in front as far as published information about the H5N1 virus. This latest publication states that the current virus flash point in Turkey shows two new mutations. The first is a switch in an amino acid change at the 223 position on the hemaglutination (H) protein. This increases it's affinity for binding to human cells and decreases it's affinity for bird cells. The second is another switch ,like the 223-haemoagglutinin mutation, it signals adaptation to humans, says Alan Hay, director of a WHO influenza laboratory at the NIMR. "There is this glutamic acid–lysine flip," he explains. "Glutamic acid is associated with flu-virus replication in birds, and lycine is in primates."These changes put us on the track to the 10 genetic changes associated with the 1918 pandemic. Dr. Tier spoke of a recent meeting where it was speculated that if we reach that ...