by Happygun » Thu Jun 29, 2006 4:58 pm
Here'a a little something I posted on a different forum a while back. It was inspired by Max Brook's excellent The Zombie Survival Guide - sort of a Werewolf equivalent . Though we originally planned on covering everything from werewolf psychology to combat tactics, we only got as far as etiology before people lost interest. The science is pretty weak, but hey, it's entertaining.
As I look back on it, a lot of the mechanisms are similar to what Uberman suggested. Perhaps I owe him an apology...
The Lupus Macrovirus
Lycanthropy – more commonly known as ‘the curse of the werewolf’ – is the condition where, among many other things, affected individuals transform into anthropomorphic wolves. We shall first examine the etiology of the disease, specifically the Lupus macrovirus, or L. macro – the agent through which the condition is passed from individual to individual.
Folklore holds that lycanthropy is spread when affected individuals bite or scratch others in their transfigured state. This would suggest that a microbe is responsible for the disease and, much like the Rhabdovirus rabies, is passed along when infected saliva or blood enters the host’s bloodstream. This is indeed the case (but see below on cell specificity). The macrovirus L. macro has been identified as the infectious vector.
Lupus macrovirus is not related to any known genus of virus or viroid. Its origin remains a mystery. It has not, as of this writing, been found outside the body of infected individuals. It is not airborne and can only survive for a limited duration (24 hours) in water, though its rate of decay increases dramatically in water with a high salinity or low pH. Its outer protein coat is irregularly shaped and embedded with numerous receptors, hence the nickname bestowed upon it by researchers – the “fuzzy” virus.
Lupus macrovirus is exceptional in many respects. Many researchers are even hesitant to label it a virus, though it shares many commonalities, among them the dependence on existent cells for replication. With that said, the L. macro differs from viruses in several ways. One, it is relatively large – over 800 nanometers in diameter – hence the genus “macrovirus.” This is comparable to many bacteria, E. coli being around a micrometer in length. Secondly, the organization and composition of L. macro is unlike anything else seen in nature. Whereas most virus coats hold at best the genome of the virus, a set of polymerases and a few other assorted proteins, L. macro carries a veritable slew of biomolecules and nucleotides, including both DNA and RNA, lipids, sugars, glycoproteins, and enzymes.
The complexity of the virus is staggering. Electron microscopy, mass spectrometry, and X-ray crystallography have revealed hundreds different proteins, many of which possess completely previously novel motifs and folding, bonded together to form highly organized complexes. There are also RNA-protein complexes similar to but much smaller than ribosomes throughout the protein coat. They seem to play a role similar to histones in the nucleus of eukaryotic cells; coils of DNA wrap along the protein/RNA complex, unwinding as the virus enters a cell. Dozens of other components remain unidentified, as they seem to consist of a conglomerate of organic and non-organic molecules.
What is truly astonishing is that the primary structure most of the virus’ proteins includes three previously unknown amino acids. They do not replace one or more of the twenty common amino acids in the three base-pair genetic code; they supplement existing ones, bringing the number of amino acids in the L. macro virus from 20 to 23. Some researchers attribute the extraordinary properties of the virus to their activity (see below).
Infection
L. Macro is spread when the virus enters the host’s blood vessels via lesions or sexual intercourse. Despite rumors to the contrary a carrier can spread the virus in both shapes, though for obvious reasons most infections occur when the carrier is in his or her anthropomorphic form. Upon contact with a host cell mistakenly identifies it as food and engulfs it. When the virus is transported to a lyzosome for digestion within the cell, the low pH triggers a complex enzymatic reaction that immediately lyses the vesicle and opens the virus capsid, releasing its contents into the cell before lyzosomal proteases have a chance to break it down. This may explain the L. macro’s vulnerability to acid (see above). Some scientists are attempting to create a countermeasure to the virus that exploits this weakness.
The virus spreads throughout the body with extraordinary quickness. This is due in part to its indiscriminate pattern of infection (see below) and its ability to accelerate its host’s metabolism. Whether or not they previously had the capacity to, infected cells immediately begin to manufacture a cocktail of hormones and/or excitatory neurotransmitters, stimulating the host’s sympathetic autonomic nervous system (this is only a mechanism to speed up the infection; it is not directly responsible for the transformation -Ed.). How this is accomplished is unknown, though it does explain the symptoms of nausea and exhilaration that follow infection.
Though technically a retrovirus, the degree to which it rewrites its host’s genetic code puts it in a league all its own. Most viruses are highly specific in what type of tissue they target. L. macro, however, appears capable of infecting virtually every cell in the human body! It even seems to be able to modify its host's chromosomes on an epigenetic level. No one has been able to propose a mechanism explaining this phenomenon.