A cure for the common cold
Posted: Thu Nov 04, 2010 2:25 pm
Independent article
Very cool that they have discovered this, but part of me is VERY scared about the bolded part...In a dramatic breakthrough that could affect millions of lives, scientists have been able to show for the first time that the body's immune defences can destroy the common cold virus after it has actually invaded the inner sanctum of a human cell, a feat that was believed until now to be impossible.
The discovery opens the door to the development of a new class of antiviral drugs that work by enhancing this natural virus-killing machinery of the cell. Scientists believe the first clinical trials of new drugs based on the findings could begin within two to five years...
"In any immunology textbook you will read that once a virus makes it into a cell, that is game over because the cell is now infected. At that point there is nothing the immune response can do other than kill that cell," said Leo James, who led the research team.
But studies at the Medical Research Council's laboratory have found that the antibodies produced by the immune system, which recognize and attack invading viruses, actually ride piggyback into the inside of a cell with the invading virus.
