Scientists Create Mad Cow-Like Protein
University of California researchers have created a synthetic protein that produces a deadly infectious disease in mice that's similar to mad cow disease. The findings are reported in Friday's edition of the journal Science.
The artificially created prion, or misfolded protein, provides strong evidence that such proteins by themselves can lead to infectious diseases without the help of genetic components like DNA and RNA, the New York Times reported.
That notion has been controversial since being introduced more than 20 years ago by University of California neurology professor Dr. Stanley Prusiner. Critics of Prusiner's hypothesis contend that only bacteria and viruses containing genetic matter can spre
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