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Updated At: Dec 26, 2021 10:24 AM (IST)
Invisible Empire: The Natural History of Viruses by Pranay Lal. Penguin Random House. Pages 278. Rs799
Book Title: Invisible Empire: The Natural History of Viruses
The world has grappled with the Covid-19 pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 virus for the last two years. Since the last week of November, a new variant of the virus, Omicron, has hogged the limelight with uncertainties about its ramifications. The pandemic has made terms like spike protein, variant, mutation, R factor, genotype, etc, enter common parlance. Today, ‘virus’ has become the catchword. Viruses are obligate parasites; that is, they need a host to get their nutrition and multiply. In the process, they can cause disease, but they can also have a positive influence on the host.
‘Invisible Empire: The Natural History of Viruses’ is a phenomenal book by Pranay Lal. It traces our understanding of viruses since the first scientific observations on ‘tobacco leaf disease’ leading to the discovery of a filterable microorganism later labelled as a virus, to the present-day knowledge of viruses jumping from animals to human beings, with the novel coronavirus being the newest pathogen. Pranay suggests that the word ‘virus’ derives from the Sanskrit term ‘vish’ (poison). “In Middle English, the use of the word got expanded and virus came to mean ‘semen’. The word therefore signifies both birth and death at once.”
The fascinating book uses historical facts, scientific and medical data, anecdotes and intriguing stories to weave an engrossing account of the different facets of viruses.
The book has 14 chapters which take the reader through how viruses cause disease, how our understanding about viruses has changed over centuries, and how some viruses are actually beneficial to mankind as well as the planet. The book is not a compendium on virology, but a scientific description of how viruses affect us in disease and health. Pranay explains how approximately 150 million years ago, an endogenous retrovirus (ERV) invaded the genome of an ancestor of man and led to development of two types of mammals, those laying eggs and those giving birth to offsprings.
The chapter on smallpox is a delight to read. It traces the origin of pox virus to a rodent gerbil, from where it passed on to camels and then to humans. Smallpox was believed to afflict man some 10,000 years BCE and spread from North Africa to India, China and Europe. The Spaniards took it to Americas and knowingly gave it to natives, causing their extermination. Pranay gives historical accounts, supplemented with scientific documentation of smallpox in a child mummy from Lithuania, a Viking-age skeleton and DNA samples from Prague museum, to suggest that the virus may date back no further than 600 CE. This would discount the theory that it had caused the death of Pharoah Ramesses V in 1145 BCE. There is lucid chronological description of development of a vaccine against smallpox by Edward Jenner, based on an observation that people infected with cowpox were immune to smallpox.
The author makes a special effort to bring out the beneficial effects of viruses. Viruses have an important role in maintaining ecological balance by reversing the earth-warming effects of excess carbon dioxide and methane. Viruses and bacteriophages regulate the growth of photosynthetic microbes like cyanobacteria burying carbon dioxide to the bottom of oceans. They also regulate the destruction of methane, the most potent green house gas, apart from controlling the metabolism of phosphates and nitrogen .There is a separate chapter on bacteriophages, viruses that kill bacteria. The antibacterial properties of water of river Ganga, first noticed by Ernest Hankin in 1895, could be attributed to bacteriophages. Because of increasing antibiotic resistance and the fact that bacteriophage therapy can be targeted against a specific bacteria, the author makes a case for more research on bacteriophages, though most researchers do not share his enthusiasm on the subject.
The book is beautifully illustrated. There are photographs of the first virus to be seen through an early prototype of an electron microscope, apart from photographic depiction of other viruses, showing their structure. There are a multitude of drawings on rabies, paintings and caricatures on smallpox vaccination, all taking back the reader to the prevalent culture and beliefs of centuries ago.
The chapter on tulips uses beautiful paintings by Dutch painters of the 16th and 17th centuries to depict the effect of viruses on the shape and pattern of tulips. Each of the chapters is supplemented with detailed notes and references too.
The book ends on a philosophical note of warning. Pranay points out that viruses are embedded within man, with nearly 8 per cent of our genes being viral in origin. A virus is capable of crossing over into man from other animals and cause disease, as has happened with the novel coronavirus. Though he does not discuss the origin of SARS-CoV-2, but the author warns that provoking nature beyond a point can have grave consequences. Instead, we could use viruses to reverse climate change or to prevent misuse of antibiotics, among other things.
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