in this video I want to explain in
simple terms what a virus is it's a
video for parents to show to their kids
or to watch themselves and then
reinterpret for their kids or really
it's for anyone who wants a simple
explanation of what a virus is to
understand what a virus is you need to
understand what a cell is you may have
heard of cells before every living thing
is made of cells and they're tiny you
are made of trillions of cells that's
how small they are if you wanted to see
a cell you need to look under a
microscope so if you had a really
powerful microscope then you look to
your skin you'd see that your skin was
made of lots of these little blobs and
their cells because you're child you're
growing very slowly you're getting
bigger and bigger and bigger as time
goes on I'm not growing anymore because
I'm an adult I'm as big as I'm gonna get
the way you grow is by the number of
cells in your body going up so the more
cells you have the bigger you become and
the way you get more cells is that the
cells inside your body get a little bit
bigger until they split in two so if you
look under a microscope you might catch
that happening you'll notice one of the
cells getting bigger and bigger and
bigger until it splits into two cells so
now you have more cells than you did
before
and that's happening all through your
body as you grow even though I'm not
growing it's still happening in my body
as well because sometimes cells die and
they need to be replaced by new cells so
cells are growing and splitting into in
my body as well our cells able to do
this well you can think of a cell a bit
like a factory full of machines but
they're not like machines you've ever
seen before they're these weird knobbly
things and they're just kind of floating
around in there but bumping into each
other when they bump into each other
they change shape it's a strange place
inside a cell but just like a normal
factory a cell brings in raw material
and turns those raw materials into
products things that your body needs to
function and we call those raw materials
nutrients
you know you get nutrients from the food
that you eat as one of your cells gets
bigger and bigger and it's ready to
split into this factory inside does
something amazing it builds a copy of
itself so that there's two of every
single machine that makes up the factory
and when it splits into two one copy of
the factory is inside one cell and
another copy is in the other isn't that
amazing it's a bit like buying a 3d
printer and then using it to print
another 3d printer that's what your
cells do all the time when they grow and
divide into how do these machines inside
your cells know what to make and when to
make them well inside every single one
of your cells is something a bit like an
instruction manual you might have heard
of it it's called DNA but DNA is not
like any instruction manual you've ever
seen before imagine taking an
instruction manual taking all the
sentences inside that manual and putting
them in one huge long line so you've got
this huge chain of letters and words
except for DNA those letters are
actually clumps of atoms so DNA tells
the machines inside the factories inside
your cells what to make and when so
that's everything we need to know about
cells let's talk about viruses viruses
are even smaller themselves to see just
how small the virus is compared to the
size of your cells imagine this is one
of your cells well then a virus would be
just that big in fact at this scale if
you look closely you'd be able to see
the individual atoms that the virus was
made of let's have a look inside one
this is coronavirus and when you look
inside there's this curly wurly thing
and that is the instruction manual for
the virus so a bit like we've got DNA in
our cells that's the instruction manual
for our cells viruses have this
instruction manual to the instruction
manual for coronavirus has a slightly
structure to DNA so we call it RNA but
it's the same idea you'll notice that
it's very cramped inside the virus
there's not much room for anything
really there's definitely no room for
any machines like there are inside cells
so there's no factory inside a virus a
virus doesn't have what it needs to make
copies of itself because there's just no
room the only way for a virus to make
copies of itself is to get inside
yourselves and use the machinery inside
your cells to make copies so how does
that happen well suppose someone who is
suffering from corona virus coughs so
they allow all these tiny droplets of
water into the air and these droplets of
water have corona virus particles in
them so if you were to breathe in some
of these droplets they would end up in
your mouth and in your throat cash in
corona virus in this way by breathing in
someone's cough we think only really
happens when you're right up close to
someone which is why we're doing this
social distancing thing so it's not
something to be scared of so long as
you're keeping your distance actually
the most common way to get corona virus
scientists think is by someone with the
infection coughing and then those
droplets landing on surfaces or maybe
they cough into their hands and touch
surfaces like door handles and then when
you touch the door handle that's got the
virus on it the virus goes onto your
hands and then maybe you touch your
mouth or you pick up some food and eat
it which is why everyone's telling you
to wash your hands it's really important
to wash your hands often and to do it
really well but in any case whatever way
it happens if the virus gets into your
Airways and it's going to start bumping
into the cells that line your Airways
and if you look at the outside of a
virus you'll notice all these funny
sticky out bits that have been cut in
purple in this picture these knobbly
bits are good at sticking to certain
types of cell in the case of corona
virus these knobbly bits on the outside
are good at sticking to the types of
cells that line our
waise and when a virus sticks to a cell
it then merges with the cell so now this
curly wurly instruction manual for the
virus is inside one of your cells so
maybe you can guess what happens next
inside your cells you've got these
machines and they're looking for things
to build they're looking for
instructions
what should I build next and normally
those instructions would come from your
DNA but now you've got this virus
instruction manual floating around and
one of these machines is just going to
bump into those instructions and start
reading those instructions and at that
point the machines inside your cell
start to build copies of the virus so
your cell fills up with copies of the
virus and they start to emerge from your
cell and now they're floating around in
your Airways and now you start to cough
and you'll start spreading viruses
through the air for the next person to
breathe in so there you go that's how
viruses work if your kids are interested
to know more about germs then I'd love
you to take a look at the bacteria book
written by me gross germs valve viruses
and funky fungi there's loads of cool
stuff in there and it's available lots
of different languages for example el
libro de las Peck DDS apparently Hong
ghost jungle is very funny but no one's
been able to explain exactly why all the
links are in the description for where
you can buy it if you're looking for
stuff to do with your kids during
lockdown
then I've got cover of other books how
to be a scientist and science is magic
full of experiments you can do at home
with things you've already got at home
I've got a new book coming out variable
for pre-order called wild scientists
it's called clever creatures in America
I'll put links to that as well
it's about all the amazing science you
can see animals and plants doing out
there in the wild yeah check it out it's
in the description thanks for watching I
hope the exploration was useful to you
and I'll see
the next one
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