With two vaccines now approved and in use, does making a vaccine for new strains of coronavirus become easier to make? | AskScience Blog

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Monday, January 4, 2021

With two vaccines now approved and in use, does making a vaccine for new strains of coronavirus become easier to make?

With two vaccines now approved and in use, does making a vaccine for new strains of coronavirus become easier to make?


With two vaccines now approved and in use, does making a vaccine for new strains of coronavirus become easier to make?

Posted: 04 Jan 2021 04:47 AM PST

I have read reports that there is concern about the South African coronavirus strain. There seems to be more anxiety over it, due to certain mutations in the protein. If the vaccine is ineffective against this strain, or other strains in the future, what would the process be to tackle it?

submitted by /u/JokerJosh123
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Pressure in a pipe using Bournellie's equation?

Posted: 04 Jan 2021 04:18 AM PST

According to Bournellie's equation, pressure and velocity have an inverse relation, given that the G.P.E remains constant. So if I increase the length of a pipe, the velocity would decrease due to greater frictional forces as there are irregularities in the pipe. As the velocity decreases, the pressure should increase, right?

However, from daily observation and I performed an experiment, the data shows that the pressure decreases( which seems plausible to me but I don't understand the theory behind it). Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

submitted by /u/arnavj0315
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Some viruses, such as measles, spread long distances via respiratory aerosols. Others, like influenza, spread shorter distances in larger respiratory droplets. What makes the difference?

Posted: 04 Jan 2021 05:25 AM PST

Obviously relevant to the current pandemic, but I'm really curious as to the physical mechanism of why one virus spreads farther than another. Does it infect a different part of the respiratory tract? Or does measles simply survive longer in the open air?

submitted by /u/GreenStrong
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What's the simplest virus known?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 10:55 PM PST

Excluding stuff like viroids, transposons and prions,

what is the virus with the most simple genetic structure that can replicate on its own (without any coinfection necessary).

I'm asking this because I was looking at the rabies virus and noticed how simple such a deadly virus can be: 5 genes : RnRp (L) and its cofactor (P), the nucleoprotein (N), the matrix protein (M), and the glycoprotein (G) for a grand total of 11kb.

This truly baffles me as I'm reading about how it can evade the immune system without dedicating any specialized protein to the process.

For those interested, for now, what I seem to understand is that rabies is poorly immunoreactive and tempts to pass under the radar of the INF-I response. It also seems to limit its cytopathogenic effects in peripherical nerves (which favors migration to the brain, where it seems to then lead to apoptosis, triggering an immune response but too late for recovery of the patient). Other reasons are also mentioned like an increase in autophagy (which might reduce the amount of CMH-I capable of triggering a response), and poor permeabilization of the blood brain barrier.

If some of you are experts in the field, I'll be glad to hear more about rabies. :)

Link of the review on rabies.

submitted by /u/-Lipo-
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What virological evidence is there that the B117 variant of Coronavirus is more easily transmitted?

Posted: 04 Jan 2021 05:09 AM PST

All the evidence reported thus far is that we're seeing more cases than expected. Apart from the rise in cases, is there any biological evidence to prove that the UK hasn't just let the situation get out of control (not that a new variant would disprove that anyway)

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Do all receptors downregulate?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 05:20 PM PST

Pretty straightforward question I guess, save for one caveat:

There's possibly more to the question than whether or not the capability is there, because there is a notable variability in how sensitive some receptors (or perhaps just receptor types, like allosteric modulators) are to (down/up)regulation. It might be more of a question of whether there are some receptors that are particularly unresponsive to this process.

If anybody could shine a light, however bright, that'd be great!

submitted by /u/Ferbeezo
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Is there any evidence that dinosaurs roared? If so, what is that evidence? (Was suggested to post this here, original post on askreddit)

Posted: 04 Jan 2021 05:44 AM PST

If the Pfizer vaccine has to be kept at -80 degrees Celsius and the Moderna vaccine has to be kept at -20 degrees Celsius, why is there more investment to transport the Pfizer one if the latter is more practical?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 07:57 PM PST

Although both versions have been approved by some countries, it's interesting to see more investment is being made by governments to purchase super chilled freezers to transport the Pfizer vaccine when the Moderna vaccine is more practical to transport with the existing infrastructure.

submitted by /u/Inaerius
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What is the cause of stereoisomerism?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 12:25 PM PST

I found descriptions of what it is, two identical chemical formulas with identical bind between toms, but different geometry. I recall a bit from high school too.

But i can't quite understand why would the atoms decide to arrange one what or another. Does it have to do with the electronic layer that happens to bind two atoms? How do you make sure you create one and not the other?

(I thought of this today https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide)

submitted by /u/MacaroonPickle8793
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How does total pressure (as supposed to partial pressure) affect the diffusion of components in a mixture?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 02:43 PM PST

Scenario A: You have a tube with a permeable membrane in the center. On one side 50/50 water and alcohol on the other pure water. Pressure between the sides are equal.

Scenario B: it's exactly the same as scenario A except that at time 0 you inject an amount of water into the 50/50 side (making it no longer 50/50). So Volume, molarity of alcohol, and temperature haven't changed but pressure has.

How does the diffusion of alcohol compare between the two scenarios?

submitted by /u/OreganoTimeSage
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Are oxygen levels higher in a forest vs. a desert because of the plant life (or lack thereof)?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 07:46 AM PST

It would seem that the amount of oxygen in the air would be higher in places where there is more plant life. Does wind (or other factors) help to distribute oxygen around the Earth more evenly?

submitted by /u/maxxcoo
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Could we map the molten flow in the Earth's core by studying the Earth's magnetic field?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 08:30 PM PST

Can maps of the flow (in the sense of ocean surface current/deep-sea current maps I guess) within the Earth's core be extrapolated from the changing shape of the Earth's magnetic field?

submitted by /u/TreyCray
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Is it possible that the Covid19 vaccines will also work for other coronaviruses?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 09:07 AM PST

With the mRNA vaccines targeting the spike protein of Covid19, I wondered if there is any biological crossover with other common Coronaviruses and therefore whether a happy additional benefit of the mass vaccination programme will be less incidences of the common cold? Thank you.

submitted by /u/303AND909
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What is the "shelf life" of COVID-19 vaccines?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 09:44 PM PST

The New York Times article argued that many vaccine dosages could expire before use due to the US's slow rollout. I find this surprising as they were only produced like one month ago. So, I'm curious, what's the average life of vaccine before they expire or become ineffective?

submitted by /u/vardhanisation
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Is it possible to re-contract covid-19 from yourself?

Posted: 04 Jan 2021 02:10 AM PST

For example: I test positive and spend 2 weeks isolated in my home, making food, showering, sleeping, etc. After I've recovered, I pick up a used glass that I drank out of before recovery and testing negative (for this example let's say used the cup Wednesday, tested negative Saturday), could you re-contract the virus from yourself?

I know this is more of just a hypothetical type question, but I haven't been able to find any info about it anywhere and I'm genuinely curious about it.

submitted by /u/MrTristian100
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In a more simplistic way: How does Vaccines work, and can you get the flu from them?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 07:24 PM PST

I tried posting on Another Reddit, got removed this is my second time posting here because it got removed from here because I said the name of the Reddit. So here: I know they don't, and I know they can't. But I want to be able to explain it simply when the time comes without having to go though so much talking to get the point across: "Vaccines don't cause you to get (Whatever virus here.)"

submitted by /u/Wolf-Go-Brrr
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What route does a lipid encapsulated vaccine take to enter our cells? Why isn't it excluded like other foreign bodies?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 03:07 PM PST

Follow up, are there viruses or bacteria that can use this same route?

submitted by /u/physicsforfools
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What is the horizontal resolution of standard definition ANALOG (not digital) video?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 09:35 AM PST

I wasn't sure how to flair this, but I picked the one that seemed the most appropriate.

I've been watching videos online about how older analog CRT televisions work. Something that caught my attention is that color CRTs used a sort of "mask" in front of the picture tube that filtered the light from the electron beam through red, green, and blue phosphors. In other words, the color part of a picture tube isn't actually composed of individual pixels like a modern display, but an array of tiny holes which block quite a lot of light in exchange for color. On a black and white display with no color phosphors, the color part of the analog signal is ignored, and there's better brightness. So, when you zoom into a black and white CRT vs a color CRT, the scanlines will be uniform and unbroken rather than divided into different colors.

That leads to a question I haven't found an answer to yet. We know there are only 480 scanlines in an analog, standard-definition NTSC video signal, but that's just the vertical resolution. What about horizontal resolution? If the scanlines on a black and white CRT aren't clearly broken down into pixel or subpixel groupings, and the "pixels" on a color CRT are just a mask covering an unbroken scanline to produce color, does this mean that, at least theoretically, the horizontal resolution of analog video is... infinite?

Yes, digital standard-definition video has a set horizontal resolution of, depending on the source, 720 pixels. But analog video doesn't use pixels, at least not originally. I've read some sources online which say that the "practical" horizontal resolution of analog video - or how many vertical lines can be separately distinguished - ranges from 700 to 1000, but I can't find a great proof of that anywhere. Plus, with modern displays getting larger, analog video upscaling could benefit from increased horizontal detail. Again, I don't actually know if there's a horizontal resolution cap for analog video, but I want to.

If you're wondering what I'm even getting at, consider 35mm film. It's not composed of pixels, but microscopic particles of silver halide. So it doesn't really have a "resolution," though it does have a practical limit at which you can't resolve much more detail. This is why it's possible to remaster old movies shot on film at 4K digital resolution; the grain contains a lot of "information" so to speak. A 32K scan of the film would probably be overkill, though. With 480 total scanlines, analog video cannot resolve any more vertical detail than 480 pixels. That said, if the... sample rate(?) of the scanlines is big enough, it might be possible to recover a lot more horizontal detail than we could see before on a regular CRT.

I hope this isn't too speculative, but I could not find a good answer for this anywhere online. I think I saw some Wikipedia articles talking about mathematical equations related to this, but I cannot understand them, and I'm not even sure they're relevant. If you have any experience in analog video, or even video in general, and you can point me to good resources on or explanations of this topic, I would love it if you could point me in that direction. I'm really trying to explore what the true limitations of analog video are. I appreciate your time.

submitted by /u/pixelperfectcolor
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Does drinking alcohol have any effect on the gut microbiome?

Posted: 02 Jan 2021 11:15 PM PST

Why does cold make things brittle?

Posted: 02 Jan 2021 11:22 PM PST

How is subatmospheric pleural pressure maintained?

Posted: 03 Jan 2021 06:15 AM PST

To my knowledge, the pressure inside the pleural cavity is always subatmospheric, during exhalation as well as during inspiration. I don't understand how this "negative" pressure is maintained. Unless the tissue is 100% air tight (which I assume it is not), I would assume there will always leak a small amount of gas into the cavity. I would expect the leakage to continue until atmospheric pressure is reached. I understand that the pleural cavity is not really a large cavity and rather a small layer filled with fluid, but I still don't understand why the subatmospheric pressure does not "suck" air into the cavity over the course of years until the subatmospheric pressure is raised to atmospheric pressure.

submitted by /u/CharLimitsAreBullshi
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