Incubation period?
(4)
I often wonder is it possible to be immune[4] to it?
I eat cow brains (cabeza in red chili and tacos too mmmm!) all the time, since I was child and I’m not dead yet? That includes eye balls, brains, olfactory nerves, tongue ect.
Prion infections are some nasty stuff, microwaves nor nuclear radiation can kill it? Meaning not even fire can incinerate it!
Seems that by looking at the dialog below plants can spread it too?
Eeeeek!
When you feed an animal or human the flesh of its own species that seems to be what causes it? (especially the brain mass)
Footnotes:
[1] “…Soto’s team analyzed the retention of infectious prion protein and infectivity in wheat grass roots and leaves incubated with prion-contaminated brain material and discovered that even highly diluted amounts can bind to the roots and leaves. When the wheat grass was consumed by hamsters, the animals were infected with the disease. The team also learned that infectious prion proteins could be detected in plants exposed to urine and feces from prion-infected hamsters and deer.
Researchers also found that plants can uptake prions from contaminated soil and transport them to different parts of the plant, which can act as a carrier of infectivity. This suggests that plants may play an important role in environmental prion contamination and the horizontal transmission of the disease.
To minimize the risk of exposure to CWD, the CDC recommends that people avoid eating meat from deer and elk that look sick or test positive for CWD. Hunters who field-dress deer in an affected area should wear gloves and minimize handling of the brain and spinal cord tissues.
“This research was done in experimental conditions in the lab,” Soto said of the next step. “We’re moving the research into environmental contamination now.” …More
[2] “…In 2009, researchers at the Medical Research Council discovered a naturally occurring variant of a prion protein in a population from Papua New Guinea that confers strong resistance to kuru. …” …More
[3] “…What disease do you get from eating human flesh? Prions cause a number of fatal diseases such as mad cow disease in cattle, scrapie in sheep and kuru and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) in humans. There is no cure and potential treatments are highly speculative. In recent years, however, biologists have discovered several animals that are immune to prion diseases. …” …More
[4] Resistance to prion disease in humans: “… Survivors of the kuru epidemic are heterozygous for a prion protein gene (prnp) with a unique amino acid change not seen in other populations, a change at position 127 from glycine to valine (G127V). The G127V change was always seen together with methionine at 129. Heterozygosity for M and V at amino acid 129, which is protective against prion disease, is found in humans all over the world. …” …More
[5] Brain disease ‘resistance gene’ evolves in Papua New Guinea community; could offer insights into CJD: “…Kuru is a fatal prion disease, similar to CJD in humans and BSE in animals, and is geographically unique to an area in Papua New Guinea. In the mid 20th Century, an epidemic of kuru devastated a population in the Eastern Highlands of Papua New Guinea. The infection was passed on at mortuary feasts, where mainly women and children consumed their deceased relatives as a mark of respect and mourning. This practice was banned and ceased in the late 1950s.
Scientists from the MRC Prion Unit, a national centre of excellence in prion diseases, assessed over 3000 people from the affected and surrounding Eastern Highland populations, including 709 who had participated in cannibalistic mortuary feasts, 152 of whom subsequently died of kuru. They discovered a novel and unique variation in the prion protein gene called G127V in people from the Purosa valley region where kuru was most rife.
This gene mutation, which is found nowhere else in the world, seems to offer high or even complete protection against the development of kuru and has become frequent in this area through natural selection over recent history, in direct response to the epidemic. This is thought be perhaps the strongest example yet of recent natural selection in humans.
Lead author Professor John Collinge, Director of the MRC Prion Unit said: “It’s absolutely fascinating to see Darwinian principles at work here. This community of people has developed their own biologically unique response to a truly terrible epidemic. The fact that this genetic evolution has happened in a matter of decades is remarkable. Kuru comes from the same disease family as CJD so the discovery of this powerful resistance factor opens up new areas for research taking us closer to understanding, treating and hopefully preventing a range of prion diseases.”
The study, which began in 1996, is published in the New England Journal of Medicine. …More
