Le 14/11/2010 20:22, Darren New a écrit :
> Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>> Fact: Virii are not "alive" in the first place, so it is not possible
>> to "kill" them.
> 
> It think if you have some unicellular organism (without being pedantic
> about "cell" there, which after all just means "room" in latin), 

But virii are not unicelluar organism. They are very far from even being
one.
Virii are more like toxin: a chain of molecules, with the added bonus
that when encountering the right cells, they get replicated by the cells
(usually at the cost of the other functions of the cell, which induce
the exhaustion of the cell and its death).

>and you
> apply a chemical that breaks up the cell and prevents it from
> reproducing, I think it's safe for purposes of that discussion at least
> to say it was alive and no longer is.

Breaking a cell is easy, as the OP says.
Breaking a molecule requires to have an actual chemical reaction, which
usually means exhausting the reacting components. Moreover, you cannot
break a molecule and hope that the results will not be a toxic (or you
just lost in another way). You need to identify the molecule, then use
the right chemical to modify the molecule... the sad thing is that what
would break a virus would also usually break far more easily the
components of your cells.

UV-light might be of some help, if the radiation is strong enough, to
tear apart some virii (but not all). But beware also to not create a new
stronger one in the process.


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