Is Reverse Engineering the Biontech-Pfizer Vaccine Similar to Programming?

[neilparker62]

TL;DR

Article on the 'source-code' of Biontech-Pfizer Vaccine

https://berthub.eu/articles/posts/reverse-engineering-source-code-of-the-biontech-pfizer-vaccine/

Would be interested to hear some expert comment on the above. I could not understand much of it but perhaps someone could summarise ? Is the comparison/analogy with computer programming valid?

 

[pinball1970]

Summary:: Article on the 'source-code' of Biontech-Pfizer Vaccine

https://berthub.eu/articles/posts/reverse-engineering-source-code-of-the-biontech-pfizer-vaccine/

Would be interested to hear some expert comment on the above. I could not understand much of it but perhaps someone could summarise ? Is the comparison/analogy with computer programming valid?

@jim mcnamara @Ygggdrasil EDIT: @atyy

 

[jim mcnamara]

The article is a bit disjointed, and the author refers the reader to other articles. The analogy is interesting but not well presented. At all.

What actually was done is several orders of magnitude more complex than it appears to be in the Readers Digest version below:

You need to know this stuff to start --

Basic background, program development, and the algorithm you want to implement:

1.  DNA is the source code for the working (compiled) runtime code, called RNA, to make proteins
2.  The wild virus is built from a protein coat and RNA inside the coat. You do not want them intact inside you.  
3. The immune system "learns" to react to the protein coat and send out an army of specialized killer cells and other proteins to render the virus particles useless.  This is the basis of vaccination and subsequent immunity.

Goal: Present the immune system with LARGE numbers of harmless exact copies of small parts of the virus protein coat. Let it run.

1. Create new DNA program from parts of the virus protein coat.
2. Some subroutines of that DNA are selected and compiled into RNA runtime (spike protein code)
3. For RNA to run it has to be fed to the operating system - a living human cell
4. RNA is packaged into LARGE numbers of lipid micro-balls which pass into the cell, unobstructed by the cell membrane
5. Cell prints a bunch of harmless proteins using RNA runtime from the lipid ball
6. Weird newly made proteins leave cell  to wander around in the blood and lymphatic tissues
7.  Immune systems reacts to kill off the foreign proteins.
8. Result: You do not get sick from the wild virus freely provided by unvaccinated people around you.

Some things we need data for, going forward.

1. How long does immunity last?
2. There are levels of immunity, so can people with lower levels of immunity infect other people?
3. The few people (~5%) who got sick (~94% or so should be just fine)  after inoculation, was disease severity reduced?

Some answers are beginning to trickle in...

 

[neilparker62]

Thanks - really interesting.