Could Scientists Really Create a Zombie Apocalypse Virus?
Someone asked Popular Science if it is feasible to make such a virus in real life.
Posted 02.24.2011 at 9:22 am
Dead HeadThe most likely culprit for this partially deteriorated brain situation, according to Schlozman, is as simple as a protein. Specifically, a proteinaceous infectious particle, a prion. Not quite a virus, and not even a living thing, prions are nearly impossible to destroy, and there’s no known cure for the diseases they cause.
The first famous prion epidemic was discovered in the early 1950s in Papua New Guinea, when members of the Fore tribe were found to be afflicted with a strange tremble. Occasionally a diseased Fore would burst into uncontrollable laughter. The tribe called the sickness “kuru,” and by the early ’60s doctors had traced its source back to the tribe’s cannibalistic funeral practices, including brain-eating.
Prions gained notoriety in the 1990s as the infectious agents that brought us bovine spongiform encephalopathy, also known as mad cow disease. When a misshapen prion enters our system, as in mad cow, our mind develops holes like a sponge. Brain scans from those infected by prion-based diseases have been compared in appearance to a shotgun blast to the head.
Now, if we’re thinking like evil geniuses set on global destruction, the trick is going to be attaching a prion to a virus, because prion diseases are fairly easy to contain within a population. To make things truly apocalyptic, we need a virus that spreads quickly and will carry the prions to the frontal lobe and cerebellum. Targeting the infection to these areas is going to be difficult, but it’s essential for creating the shambling, dim-witted creature we expect.
Jay Fishman, director of transplant infectious diseases at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, proposes using a virus that causes encephalitis, an inflammation of the brain’s casing. Herpes would work, and so would West Nile, but attaching a prion to a virus is, Fishman adds, “a fairly unlikely” scenario. And then, after infection, we need to stop the prion takeover so that our zombies don’t go completely comatose, their minds rendered entirely useless. Schlozman suggests adding sodium bicarbonate to induce metabolic alkalosis, which raises the body’s pH and makes it difficult for proteins like prions to proliferate. With alkalosis, he says, “you’d have seizures, twitching, and just look awful like a zombie."
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2011-02/fyi-could-scientists-reall...
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Zombie Cows!!
Zombie Cows
What we think about when we think about zombies today can be traced back to a single source: the 1968 film Night of the Living Dead. In it, an army of flesh-eating corpses reanimated by radiation attack a group of rural Pennsylvanians. Though the word “zombie” is never actually uttered, the movie’s shambling, slow-witted, cannibalistic undead remade the zombie for the nuclear age. Today, zombism is most often portrayed on screen as the symptoms of a virus— pandemics have replaced the threat of nuclear war.
These shuffling movie zombies have partially deteriorated, but still intact, brains, a condition which could be caused by a protein called a proteinaceous infectious particle, or prion. Prions are the infectious agents that brought us mad cow disease. When a misshapen prion enters our system, as in the case of mad cow, the rest of our prions take on its shape and the mind literally begins turning into mush. Relatives of victims of prion-caused diseases have looked at MRIs of their loved ones’ skulls and likened the scene to a shotgun blast to the head. And since prions aren’t even alive, they are nearly impossible to destroy. There are no known cures for prion-based diseases, and the proteins can still infect others years after their host-victim has died. The United Kingdom mandated that those killed by mad cow disease be buried in graves at least nine feet deep.
http://www.popsci.com/science/gallery/2011-02/gallery-terrifying-real-li...
Zombie Humans
Zombie Humans
Prions began to be linked to zombie-like diseases in the early 1950s, when Australian administrators were exploring the Eastern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea and discovered that members of the Fore tribe had been afflicted with a strange tremble, occasionally punctuated with bursts of uncontrollable laughter. The tribe called the disease kuru, and by the early '60s Australian doctor Michael Alpers had traced its source back to the Fore’s cannibalistic funeral practices, especially brain eating.
http://www.popsci.com/science/gallery/2011-02/gallery-terrifying-real-li...
Zombie Spray
Zombie-Making Spray
Prions aren't airborne...yet. But a new study from a group of pathologists in Zurich, Switzerland took concentrations of aerosolized prions and exposed mice to the spray. It turned out to be 100 percent lethal.
http://www.popsci.com/science/gallery/2011-02/gallery-terrifying-real-li...
Zombie Ants!
Zombie Ants
Leaf-cutter ants in Southeast Asia have their minds controlled by an infectious fungus called Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, which makes the ant walk to the perfect position in the forest before killing its host, bursting through the ant's skull, and releasing its spores into the forest.
http://www.popsci.com/science/gallery/2011-02/gallery-terrifying-real-li...
BOOM, Headshot!!! being a
BOOM, Headshot!!! being a mechanism for fungi-spore-proliferation means we'd have to fall back to flame-throwers instead of shotguns, if this ever happened to humans.
Zombie Cockroaches!
Zombie Cockroaches
Before they appeared in movies, zombies played an important role in voodoo (or vodoun) culture in West Africa and Haiti. The word probably comes from nzambi, which roughly translates to, “spirit of a dead person.” Zombies are humans without a soul. In the early 1980s, ethnobotanist Wade Davis proposed that zombies were more than mere witchcraft and folklore, and that zombie powder found in Haitian ceremonies might be derived from tetrodotoxin, a powerful neurotoxin that blocks nerve channels.
Davis drew his hypothesis partially from real-world examples such as the female jewel wasp (pictured), which injects its tetrodotoxin into a cockroach’s brain, shutting down the roach’s fight-or-flight response. The wasp then leads the drugged bug into its burrow, lays its eggs upon the cockroach’s abdomen and, eight days later, the larvae hatch and feed upon the roach, burrowing into its innards. The cockroach is alive throughout and under the wasp’s control.
http://www.popsci.com/science/gallery/2011-02/gallery-terrifying-real-li...
Though in the other camp -
http://www.cracked.com/article_18683_7-scientific-reasons-zombie-outbreak-would-fail-quickly.html
BRRRIIIIIIIAAAAAN! I WANT BRRRRIIIIIIIAAAAAAAAN!
At this time of year it is
At this time of year it is common to think about the zombie apocalypse. Back to your question, I think that's quite impossible. Halloween season is here again. You need to contemplate -- am I economically ready, should the dead start to rise, move the earth and feast on the living?? Here are several things you are able to do to be more ready. And these suggestions aren't just for the zombie apocalypse. They work for other forms of disasters also. Are you financially prepared for the zombie apocalypse? Be prepared so you can enjoy this season with your family and friends.
!
Personally I find the bot resurrecting an 8 month old thread about zombies to be hilarious, so I'm not deleting the post. I did remove its link, though.
BUT!
I WANT TO BE FINANCIALLY READY FOR THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE!!!