Viruses
Diseases and their causal infectious agents organized by points of entry and contact area

1 - Be able to describe the structures of naked and enveloped viruses.

2 - Be able to describe the different types of genetic material included in viruses.

3 - Be able to classify viruses based on size and structure, genetic material and the host they infect.

4 - Be able to describe the steps involved in the "proliferation" of a virus, from attachment to release.

5 - Be able to explain what is meant by the terms "temperate virus", "lysogen" and "lysogeny", and related terms used to describe viruses that infect bacteria ("bacteriophages").

5 - Be able to describe how bacteriophages can be quantified.

6 - Be able to describe the 3 types of permissive interactions between animals and their viruses (lytic, persistent, latent).

7 - Describe the mode of action (infection, replication, release) of HIV in the human body.

8 - Describe AIDS.

Topic 10. Microorganisms and viruses in health and disease of the human host

-Know the terms and interactions described with the terms parasite, pathogen, pathogenicity, virulence, avirulence, disease, symptoms of disease, etc.

-Know the major "contact areas" between microbes and animal hosts (portals of entry - infection - portals of exit) as well as factors that determine the interactions.

-Understand the concept of microbial virulence factors.

- Describe the major ways in which diseases are transmitted; know about modes (contact or indirect) and agents of transmission (vectors, vehicles, fomites).

- In particular, know relevant epidemiology terminology including incidence, prevalence, outbreak, epidemic, endemic, pandemic, mortality, morbidity, carrier, vector, fomite, vehicle, host, etc.

- Be able to characterize drug resistance and nosocomial infections.

- In the following we view a few diseases from the angle of a microbiologist, hence we ask for the reservoir, the transmission (e.g., vector) and the host and how the host gets diseased. As you are all aware of, this course did not attempt to teach medical microbiology, hence, you do not have to know any clinical aspects of the diseases for this class and exam.

- Know examples for respiratory infections (e.g., diphtheria, TB, wooping cough) and why they are so common.

- Know examples for sexually transmitted diseases.

- Know examples for food and water born diseases (e.g., food poisoning; typhus, cholera).

- Know examples for insect-transmitted diseases (e.g., Lyme disease, malaria, plague).

- Know the components of the blood and lymphatic systems and their role in host-parasite interactions.

- know general characteristics (portals of entry, natural flora (AKA resident biota, normal biota), main pathogens, etc.) of the discussed contact areas (GIT, RT, GUT, Skin, vascular and nervous systems). For instance in the genitourinary tract, we know bacterial (Neisseria, Escherichia, Staphylococcus, Gardnerella, Treponema, Chlamydia, Group B Streptococcus), fungal (Candida), helminth (Trichomonas) and viral (HPV, HSV) dieseases; whereas non-hemolytic streptococci, lactobacilli and fungi (only vaginal) are the main players in the natural flora.