Table Of Content1111995511__99778899881111222244774444__TTPP..iinndddd 11 44//88//2200 55::5544 PPMM
b2530 International Strategic Relations and China’s National Security: World at the Crossroads
TTTThhhhiiiissss ppppaaaaggggeeee iiiinnnntttteeeennnnttttiiiioooonnnnaaaallllllllyyyy lllleeeefffftttt bbbbllllaaaannnnkkkk
b2530_FM.indd 6 01-Sep-16 11:03:06 AM
World Scientific
1111995511__99778899881111222244774444__TTPP..iinndddd 22 44//88//2200 55::5544 PPMM
Published by
World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
5 Toh Tuck Link, Singapore 596224
USA office: 27 Warren Street, Suite 401-402, Hackensack, NJ 07601
UK office: 57 Shelton Street, Covent Garden, London WC2H 9HE
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Mölling, Karin, 1943– author.
Title: Viruses : more friends than foes / Karin Moelling.
Other titles: Supermacht des Lebens. English
Description: Revised edition. | New Jersey : World Scientific, [2020] |
“Originally published in German as Viren: Supermacht des Lebens
(C.H. Beck, Munich, 2020)”-- T.p. verso. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020034692 | ISBN 9789811227578 (hardcover) |
ISBN 9789811224744 (paperback) | ISBN 9789811224751 (ebook for institutions) |
ISBN 9789811224768 (ebook for individuals)
Subjects: MESH: Viruses
Classification: LCC QR394.5 | NLM QW 160 | DDC 579.2/4--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020034692
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Copyright © 2020 by World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
All rights reserved.
For photocopying of material in this volume, please pay a copying fee through the Copyright Clearance
Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. In this case permission to photocopy
is not required from the publisher.
For any available supplementary material, please visit
https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/11951#t=suppl
Printed in Singapore
KKiimm -- 1111995511 -- VViirruusseess -- MMoorree FFrriieennddss tthhaann FFooeess -- RReevviisseedd EEddiittiioonn..iinndddd 11 33//88//22002200 11::4400::5500 ppmm
“9x6” b3959 Viruses: More Friends Than Foes — Revised Edition
v
Preface
We stand on the shoulders of giants. Standing next to giants, I have over
the decades made the acquaintance of some of the most prominent
researchers of my generation — listening to and watching them, mostly
with high admiration and respect, and sometimes contributing myself. On
this basis, but also to some extent in opposition to what I saw, this book
was initiated as an “anti-virus book”. Viruses as we usually encounter them
are dangerous, terrifying creatures; they are destructive, threatening and
downright nasty. However, they contribute to our existence, to our envi-
ronment, to the development of life and to evolution. They are parts of our
genes! This positive side of viruses and microorganisms is almost always
ignored, and they deserve more credit for it than they are generally given.
Here the reader will encounter this other world of viruses, and I hope that
our journey through it will be entertaining, not sinister, not too scientific,
always a bit relaxing, sometimes provocative, scientifically up to date, and
sometimes a little futuristic.
Every reader will find occasion to be surprised about the viruses: where
they are active on our planet, in the oceans, in our gardens and trees, inside
and outside our body — including guts, brain, or birth canal. The viruses
influence our well-being, our souls, fear or courageousness, depression,
freedom and decision-making — and to give an example: even obesity.
Imagine, HIV-like viruses made egg-laying obsolete for us humans since
millions of years. I hope that readers will be fascinated more than once —
as indeed I was too during writing.
I was studying and teaching about the disease-causing viruses for more
than 40 years — which are not the main topic here — so, I know about
HIV/AIDS — but I believe that most viral diseases are man-made due to
poverty, lack of hygiene, mobility, or habits.
b3959_FM.indd 5 04-08-2020 4.22.01 PM
b3959 Viruses: More Friends Than Foes — Revised Edition “9x6”
vi VIRUSES: MORE FRIENDS THAN FOES vii PREFACE
The reader will set off on a journey into the innermost part of what
makes up our world. Today, Goethe’s or Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus would quite
probably be a molecular biologist — perhaps even a virologist, because
the “Viro-sphere” includes the whole world, even the universe! Perhaps
Goethe would have honored the viruses if he knew about their existence
and their importance.
Indeed, the “Homunculus”, which Goethe designed, places Dr. Faustus
close to our molecular world. How did life start? And how does it end?
How do progress and innovation come about — of course by viruses
and their famous “sloppiness”. And the “noisy lemurs, which fall head-
over-tail into their graves” can also be found here, even though they are
not quite like those in Goethe’s “Faust” — in fact, they are very strange
creatures, which since 13 million years carry HIV-like viruses!
The book does not need to be read from beginning to end, but rather
by choosing, picking, jumping, turning over pages, and skipping passages
if they seem too difficult or contain too much scientific detail. A glossary
and list of references is provided for further information. However, the
end, the last chapter, is intended for everybody, as it condenses and sum-
marises many details, with voices combined in a final tutti as at the end of
a fugue by my hero, Johann Sebastian Bach.
I take the risk of reflecting on how science progresses, and on what
forces drive the everyday activities of research scientists. I consider myself
as a witness, a spectator, who can describe some of my own experiences —
though with the idea and the hope that they will be taken as representative
and general, and not appear too personal. At some points my comments
will be quite critical, but I write without bitterness or resentment — rather,
slightly amused about what happened, what I missed, and what today still
keeps me going. So some parts are detective story-like for entertainment.
Other parts are rather philosophical, so you, dear reader, can choose.
A colleague characterized the German version of this book as three
volumes in one: a detective story about scientists, a popular account of
science spanning many decades, and a philosophical work. I am not a phi-
losopher, but science leads us to wonder and to reflect. Another apposite
comment comes from the German writer and film-producer Alexander
Kluge in his recent “Chronicle”, in which he describes me as story-teller of
“Goodnight Stories”, just like the ones he liked to listen to by his nanny
as a 5-year-old boy. There are two options, then, either you fall asleep or
b3959_FM.indd 6 04-08-2020 4.22.01 PM
“9x6” b3959 Viruses: More Friends Than Foes — Revised Edition
vi VIRUSES: MORE FRIENDS THAN FOES vii PREFACE
you find the stories amusing and simple enough to listen. I am writing not
only for academic colleagues from similar or related fields, but also, and
perhaps primarily, for students and for lay people of all kinds — readers
who can simply ignore some of the more specialized scientific remarks.
Read about Cesarean sections or Dutch Famine and their consequences for
the newborns. Did you know that viruses can “see”? Or look at the chapter
on tulips, the first financial crisis ever — with viruses as the cause! Thus,
economists may also learn some surprising facts.
Whom do I have to thank? All those whom I have met — not only the
giants, because every human being is inspiring and has something to hand
on to others. I have always liked to listen to the “little shots”.
So many people and organisations have contributed so much to my
life; these contributions are interwoven to such an extent that they can-
not be separated any more. Many have supported me: my parents, school,
universities, funding organisations, scholarships, research organisations, as
well as society as a whole. They have all accompanied me along the path
and allowed me to find my way. Not least, they have financed my research,
the most expensive hobby on earth: on viruses and cancer.
Along the way, I have always had to interact with young people, many
of whom it was my responsibility to motivate and support — this I did not
only as a duty, but also with great pleasure and enjoyment, sometimes with
success They kept me young and flexible. And, last but not least: strong
enemies made me strong. This last challenge was harder to meet than it
sounds, and I had no idea how to cope with it — so I took a colleague’s
advice: “Hide in a sewer, close the cover, and try to produce good papers —
that will be your life-saver!”
The foundation Studienstiftung showed great generosity and patience
in supporting my unexpected transition from physics to molecular biology
at Berkeley, USA, at a time when student riots were raging across the cam-
pus; in fact, the Studienstiftung made that transition possible. The decision
to dive into the unknown, the field of molecular biology, at a time when
nobody could even explain to me what molecular biology was about, was
one of the hardest I have ever had to take. Then I became a researcher
and scientist against everybody’s advice. The Max Planck Institute for
Molecular Genetics, Berlin, supported me so that I was able to perform
independent research for twenty years, during which time I had the good
luck to obtain several novel results on viruses and cancer, that carried me
b3959_FM.indd 7 04-08-2020 4.22.01 PM
b3959 Viruses: More Friends Than Foes — Revised Edition “9x6”
viii VIRUSES: MORE FRIENDS THAN FOES ix PREFACE
on into the future, even though this turned out to be much more difficult
than anticipated. All this happened at times when women were as rare in
the Max Planck Society “as in the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under
Herbert von Karajan, or in the Hierarchy of the Catholic Church”. At the
time they had one each: Sabine Meyer, the then very young clarinettist, and
Saint Mary, mother of Jesus — as Heinz Schuster, then Director of the Max
Planck Institute, stressed in a public lecture. I was lucky and profited from
his support.
I am very grateful to the University of Zürich for allowing me to per-
form my research over many years and for taking the courageous decision
to appoint me, as a non-medical doctor, to the Medical Faculty — as the
only female Director in the “pre-gender” era. “Keep your mouth shut in
public” was a serious advice from a friend, who knew the scene and his
colleagues — so obviously not everybody was equally convinced. I should
have been more obedient.
I am grateful to Manfred Eigen, at the Max Planck Institute for
Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, for his numerous generous invi-
tations to the RNA world of his renowned annual Winter Seminars in
Klosters, Switzerland, where some of the ideas discussed in this book were
initiated. I was admitted as a retrovirologist — since Eigen regarded these
viruses as a great model for evolution, as the reader will see. I admired
Eigen’s broad knowledge and visions — and how his often simple calcula-
tions about reaction kinetics, numbers, interaction parameters made some
speakers get lost.
I also thank the Institutes for Advanced Study at Berlin and at Princeton
for their invitations and their support, for their stimulating atmospheres
where ideas could be created and grow in a milieu of discussion, and for
the fantastic invitation to enter very distant new worlds of thought. I hanker
after the use of blackboard and chalk, as these evoke memories of the most
lively and spontaneous discussions at Princeton. John Hopfield or Freeman
Dyson at the blackboard will always be unforgettable for me. Thinking
about neuronal networks or quantum mechanics they asked completely
different questions than brain-washed insiders do. Dyson warned me
about writing a book on viruses: “People want to know about people,
people do not want to know about genetics!” I tried to follow his advice
while writing this book.
b3959_FM.indd 8 04-08-2020 4.22.01 PM
“9x6” b3959 Viruses: More Friends Than Foes — Revised Edition
viii VIRUSES: MORE FRIENDS THAN FOES ix PREFACE
My special thanks go to my former students, co-workers and
co-authors on so many papers, whose work I refer to in various chapters,
and who kept me young and energetic. Most of them were so enthusiastic
about science that they often forgot about career planning and to think
about their future. We spent many enjoyable hours and a significant part
of my life together.
My special thanks go to Felix Broecker for his critical reading of the
German and the English versions of the book from the point of view of
a young scientist, and for verifying the many updates, numbers, facts,
credits, names, and references to other publications. I am grateful to
Ulrike Kahle-Steinweh for her comments from the point of view of a
lay person and her never-failing encouragement. Also Alfred Pingoud,
who sadly enough has already passed away, deserved many thanks, not
least because he was not always of the same opinion as I was. My thanks
also go to Stefan Bollmann — who was this book’s editor at the German
publisher C.H. Beck, and who suffered from but tolerated my style — and
to Paul Woolley, who edited the first draft of my English manuscript.
I have had to experience the limits of cancer research twice in a sad
way. I dedicate this book to the memory of Heinz Schuster, one of the
founders of the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin.
He was enthusiastic and supportive of my work, and a close and gener-
ous friend. I dedicate this book also to Paul Gredinger, in Zurich — a
non-scientist, who regretted knowing so little about science, he would
study in his “next life”. He was known as an innovative creative operator
of an Art and Think Tank. He gave me the unforgettable advice: If some-
one steals your results, it is an honor for you. And most importantly:
Do not attend the meetings of your peers but of your non-peers; that
is much more innovative. He was so right. Both of them I was allowed
to accompany, to share ideas and thoughts with. They inspired me, they
made my life happy — and often they had more confidence in me than
I myself had.
Twice I had to learn to say goodbye forever — farewells that I cannot
forget. I have tried to by writing this book.
Berlin/Zurich, 2016 Karin Moelling
b3959_FM.indd 9 04-08-2020 4.22.01 PM
