The coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 that has dominated the news since early 2020 has something in common with other diseases that have hit the headlines in recent years. SARS-CoV-2, just like Ebola, HIV and MERS before it, originated in wildlife before ‘spilling over’ into humans. SARSCoV-2 currently appears to have originated in horseshoe bats and was potentially transferred to humans via an unknown species, possibly pangolins. But other so-called zoonotic diseases (illnesses that spread from animals to humans, and vice versa) originated in the likes of chimps, camels and mice.
While the existence of zoonotic diseases has been known for decades, the coronavirus pandemic has brought into sharp focus how closely our health is connected to the health of the animal species with which we come into contact. “This pandemic is just a tragic wake-up call,” says epidemiologist Dr Jonna Mazet at the University of California, Davis.
Mazet was principal investigator on the PREDICT project, a $207m (£150m approx) global effort run from the US to build a clearer picture of the viruses lurking in wild animals that could spill over into humans and wreak havoc. From 2009 to 2019, the project’s scientists collected samples of animal blood, saliva and dung from fields and forests in 30 countries. They found 940 virus species that hadn’t been previously identified, including 160 coronaviruses and one new Ebola virus that were previously unknown. But this may just be the tip of the iceberg. “We estimate there are probably about 500,000 viruses that could infect people that have not been characterised or detected by science,” says Mazet. Not all of these would cause disease, but it shows the scale of the problem.
Denne historien er fra May 2021-utgaven av BBC Focus - Science & Technology.
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Denne historien er fra May 2021-utgaven av BBC Focus - Science & Technology.
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Do We Finally Know How the Egyptian Pyramids Were Built? - A number of breakthrough studies are beginning to paint a picture of how these wonders of the world were built, but much of the story still remains a mystery...
A number of breakthrough studies are beginning to paint a picture of how these wonders of the world were built, but much of the story still remains a mystery...How the Egyptian pyramids were built has long been a mystery. Constructed as tombs for the pharaohs over 4,000 years ago, more than 100 of them remain. The largest one, the Great Pyramid of Giza, was originally 147m tall (482ft). It's made up of about 2.3 million stone blocks, each weighing between 2.5 and 15 tonnes, and would have had to be transported to the building site and lifted into place with techniques available at the time. To put this into context, it's akin to lifting a double-decker London bus to the top of St Pauls Cathedral a few million times.
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