Copy error: mid-week links
Virus variants, the history of agriculture and the search for life on Mars.
In this week’s article, I talked about the new variants of Covid-19 and what they might mean for us. If you are interested to find out more about these variants, here are a couple more articles on the topic. The first article talks about what the variants are, but it also has a lovely graphic of the virus’s spike protein. It’s worth checking out just for that. The second article, from The Conversation, examines how much more harm a more transmissible variant can do. It makes for sobering reading.
For more background in how RNA and DNA viruses mutate, here is a short article about mutation and how it contributes to virus evolution.
If you are thoroughly sick of Covid-19 right now, and I certainly wouldn’t blame you if you were, here is an article that I came across while researching mutations and evolution, about the domestication of plants and animals.
Finally, here’s something completely different – a short article on Substack about NASA’s Perseverance rover. This is a really exciting mission – the first to be really focused on determining whether there was ever life on Mars. I will be following Perseverance and hope to bring you more information in the future.
Next week, the Turnstone takes a break. I will see you all again on the 7th of March. If you have any suggestions for topics or articles which I should highlight, please let me know.
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