TWiV 439: The purloined envelope

Paul Bieniasz joins the TWiV team to talk about the co-option, millions of years ago, of an endogenous retrovirus envelope protein by hominid ancestors for host defense against viral infection. Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, Alan Dove, Rich Condit, and Kathy Spindler Guest: Paul Bieniasz   Become a patron of TWiV! Links for this episode ASM Grant Writing Online Course Bieniasz Laboratory Julius S. Youngner, 96 Distinguished virology career of Julius S. Youngner (TWiV 373) Reconstitution of a human ERV (PNAS) Co-option of ERV envelope for host defense (eLife) Letters read on TWiV 439 Weekly Science Picks Kathy - UM Science Communication TeachOut Alan - LLNL nuclear test videos Rich - The Great A.I. Awakening  (Artificial neural network; DeepDream; DeepDream images) Dickson - Cassini imagesPaul - Howard Hughes Medical Institute Vincent - Google rewrites search rankings; Senator Whitehouse on politics of climate change Listener Pick Anthony - Raspberry Pi 3 Model B Weather Monitor Kit Intro music is by Ronald Jenkees. Send your virology questions and comments to [email protected]