this is SARS Co-V - it belongs to the family of coronaviruses named for the crown like spikes on their surfaces SARS Co V - can cause Covid 19 a contagious viral infection that attacks primarily your throat and lungs what actually happens in your body when you contract the corona virus what exactly causes your body to develop pneumonia and how would a vaccine work the corona virus must infect living cells in order to reproduce let's have a closer look inside the virus genetic material contains the information to make more copies of itself a protein shell provides
a hard protective enclosure for the genetic material as the virus travels between the people it infects an outer envelope allows the virus to infect cells by merging with the cell's outer membrane projecting from the envelope are spikes of protein molecules both a typical influenza virus and the new corona virus use their spikes like a key to get inside a cell in your body where it takes over the cells internal machinery repurposing it to build the components of new viruses when an infected person talks coughs or sneezes droplets carrying the virus may land in your mouth
or nose and then move into your lungs once inside your body the virus comes in contact with cells in your throat nose or lungs one spike on the virus inserts into a receptor molecule on your healthy cell membrane like a key in a lock this action allows the virus to get inside your cell a typical flu virus would travel inside a sac made from your cell membrane to your cell's nucleus that houses all its genetic material the coronavirus on the other hand doesn't need to enter the host cell nucleus it can directly access parts of
the host cell called ribosomes ribosomes use genetic information from the virus to make viral proteins such as the spikes on the virus's surface a packaging structure in your cell then carries the spikes in vesicles which merge with your cells outer layer the cell membrane all the parts needed to create a new virus gathered just beneath your cell's membrane then a new virus begins to butt off from the cell's membrane now with the virus spreading in your body how can you develop pneumonia symptoms for this we'll have to look into your lungs each lung has separate
sections called lobes normally as you breathe air moves freely through your trachea or windpipe then through large tubes called bronchioles called bronchioles and finally into tiny sacs called alveoli your Airways and alveoli are flexible and springy when you breathe in each air sac inflates like a small balloon and when you exhale the sacs deflate small blood vessels called capillaries surround your alveoli oxygen from the air you breathe passes into your capillaries and then carbon dioxide from your body passes out of your capillaries into your alveoli so that your lungs can get rid of it when
you exhale your Airways catch most germs in the mucus that lines your trachea bronchi and bronchioles in a healthy body hair like cilia lining the tubes constantly push the mucus and germs out of your Airways where you might expel them by coughing normally cells of your immune system attack viruses and germs that make it past your mucus and cilia and enter your alveoli however if your immune system is weakened like in the case of a corona virus infection the virus can overwhelm your immune cells and your bronchioles and alveoli become inflamed as your immune system
attacks the multiplying viruses the inflammation can cause your alveoli to fill with fluid making it difficult for your body to get the oxygen it needs you could develop low burn pneumonia where one lobe of your lungs is affected or you could have bronchopneumonia that affects many areas of both lungs pneumonia may cause difficulty breathing chest pain coughing fever and chills confusion headache muscle pain and fatigue it can also lead to more serious complications respiratory failure occurs when your breathing becomes so difficult that you need a machine called a ventilator to help you breathe these are
the machines that save lives and that medical device companies currently ramp up production for whether you would develop these symptoms depends on a lot of factors such as your a agent whether you already have an existing condition while this all sounds scary the push to develop a corona virus vaccine is moving at high speed studies of other corona viruses led most researchers to assume that people who have recovered from a SARS co2 infection could be protected from reinfection for a period of time but that assumption needs to be backed by empirical evidence and some studies
suggest otherwise there are several different approaches for a potential vaccine against the corona virus the basic idea is that you would get a shot that contains faint versions of the virus the vaccine would expose your body to a version of the virus that is too weak to cause infection but just strong enough to stimulate an immune response within a few weeks cells in your immune system would make markers called antibodies which would be specific for only the corona virus or specifically its spike protein antibodies then attach to the virus and prevent it from attaching to
your cells your immune system then responds to signals from the antibodies by consuming and destroying the clumps of viruses if you then catch the real virus at a later stage your body would recognize it and destroy it in other words your immune system is now collecting evidence on whether this will be possible safe and effective is part of what's taking researchers so long to develop a vaccine it's a race against time to develop a vaccine amid a pandemic each step in vaccine development usually takes months if not years an Ebola vaccine broke records by being
ready in five years the hope here is to develop one for the new coronavirus in a record-breaking 12 to 18 months while all this will take time stay home if you can to protect the most vulnerable and don't forget to wash your hands for at least 20 seconds and as often as possible this video was a collaboration between nucleus medical media and the what if channel where we usually dive into hypothetical scenarios about the human body humanity our planet and the cosmos check out our channel by visiting the link in the description below
