Does anyone know about Prions?

Question

What are the fundamental units of Prions?

Answer 1

Just did a paper on Prion Disease.
Also called BSE, Mad Cow.

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/100/19/10960

The fundamental unit of infectivity remains unknown.

Hey Cristi@n
YOU DID NOT ANSWER THE QUESTION!!!

...

Answer 2

A prion (IPA: [ˈpriːɒn][1] listen (help·info)) — short for proteinaceous infectious particle — (by analogy to virion); is a type of infectious agent, as it is made only of protein. Prions are abnormally-structured forms of a host protein, which are able to convert normal molecules of the protein into the abnormally structured form. Unlike other pathogens, prions are generally quite resistant to denaturation by protease, heat, radiation, and formalin treatments[2], although potency or infectivity can be reduced.

Prion can also refer to the specific protein (or gene) associated with and generally believed to be responsible for transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs). These include scrapie (a disease of sheep), chronic wasting disease, (in deer and elk), variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), and bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE or mad cow disease), all caused by homologous proteins in different species.[3] It should be noted that the same gene is responsible for spongiform encephalopathies which are not known to be transmissible, as well as some non-neurological diseases. Some require a mutation for transmission to occur, and there are respective mutations which can prevent transmission for most of the TSEs. A non-disease function of the prion gene is not known, but an area of considerable active research.

All of these diseases affect the structure of the brain or other neural tissue, and all are fatal and untreatable. However, a vaccine has been developed in mice that may provide insight into providing a vaccine in humans to resist prion infections. (see external links below, Science Daily article on vaccine)

Proteins showing prion behaviour are also found in some fungi. Some fungal prions may not be associated with any disease; it is unknown whether these prions represent an evolutionary advantage for their hosts. All known prions are believed to infect and propagate by formation of an amyloid fold, in which the protein polymerizes into a fiber with a core consisting of tightly packed beta sheets. Other mechanisms may exist in yet undiscovered infectious protein particles

help you?

Answer 3

just buy a bigger size