Story appeared on The New Scientist website at
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994318

and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at
http://www.hhmi.org/news/karupiah.html

The New Scientist, October 29, 2003
Title: "US develops lethal new viruses"
Author: Debora MacKenzie

Faculty Evaluator: Lynn Cominsky Ph.D.
Student Researcher: Brian Pederson

Mainstream media coverage:
CBS News, November 1, 2003
CNN News, October 31, 2003

Scientists funded by the US government have developed a way to make
pox viruses incredibly deadly. Ostensibly, this research is being
conducted as part of the plan to fight possible bio-terror attacks.
The new virus kills all mice even if they have been given antiviral
drugs along with a vaccine that would normally protect the victim from
death. Mark Buller of the University of St. Louis has managed to
modify mousepox, rabbitpox, and cowpox viruses so that they are deadly
to vaccinated mice nearly 100% of the time through the introduction of
an immunosuppressant protein called Interleukin-4 (IL-4). The modified
pox viruses eliminate the immune system's cell-mediated response. They
are now immune to the antiviral drug Cidofovir, known to be the last
line of defense in treating resistant viruses.

Scientists at the Australian National University in Canberra made the
original discovery by accident, though their virus only killed off
sixty percent of infected mice. As a side effect of introducing IL-4
into pox viruses, the virus becomes species specific and
non-communicable, though no one is quite sure why this is the case.

The implications of this discovery and their disclosure are
staggering. IL-4 is a protein common in genetic research and as such
is available on the Internet for as low as sixty dollars. Furthermore
the procedure is simple, something that a biology graduate student
should be able to manage without trouble. The bio-terrorist potential
for an IL-4 modified pox virus that infects humans is extraordinary.
Like anthrax, only those who come into contact with the virus itself
would become infected. The virus would not spread and infect the
attackers. Neither would it require state of the art scientific
facilities to create such a virus. Buller and his team are currently
working on a drug to resist the new viruses, but have so far been
unsuccessful in