[mquander]

Oh, you mean the sentence about how the eccentric scientist has been persecuted by the establishment for his contrarian work?

To me, that sounds so much like the output of a journalist's nearest-cliche algorithm that it's impossible to say whether there's any truth in it, or how much.

[pak]

Thank you. Sometimes I wish journalists writing about scientists were subject to the same peer-review process that scientists are. E.g.,

"One binds to viral double-stranded ribonucleic acid, a type of molecule found in all viruses."

Goddamnit, no it isn't (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus#Baltimore_classification). Some viruses contain DNA, not RNA, in the capsid. The proposed treatment acts on dsRNA made after the virus has entered the cell, and the only hope of it working on DNA viruses is if sufficient dsRNA is produced during transcription of the viral genome (I'm not convinced—the citations for this in Rider's paper are weak).