Question: when you infect the lung, what is it that you're looking for?

Natt Day answered on 15 Jun 2015:

Hi,

So when I infect the lung cells with the cold, I look for these chemicals called Interferons. What happens is the cells that are infected by the cold send out these Interferons as a danger signal to warn neighbouring cells that there’s an infection floating around and that it is infected so be prepared!

If the neighbouring cell is not infected– it utilises the Interferon danger signal to change some of its’ characteristics to make it less likely to be infected and to mean if the virus does infect that cell, it cannot produce any copies of itself. So basically the Interferon interferes with the virus lifecycle and decreases the likelihood of it producing loads of copies to release and making it easier for the immune cells to come in and clear up all the other cold particles!

Natt