Science: New Insight on Deadly Spanish Flu May Aid Today's Flu Research

The 1918 Spanish flu was a global disaster, killing an estimated 20 to 50 million people, many of them otherwise healthy adults. By partially reconstructing the Spanish flu virus, researchers have now discovered at least part of what made the virus so lethal, thus providing essential information for influenza drug and vaccine research.

Using the virus' genome sequence, a research group headed by Terrence Tumpey of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention created a live virus with all eight of the Spanish flu viral genes. The genome sequence information was recovered in fragments from lung autopsy materials and lung tissues from a flu victim who was buried in the Alaskan permafrost in 1918.

The research appears in the 7 October issue of the journal Science, published by AAAS.

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