Two teams of researchers — one from the University of Wisconsin in Madison and the other at Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands — designed experiments to identify which genetic mutations were essential for a successful jump from birds to people. They injected bird flu viruses into the noses of ferrets, waited for the viruses to replicate, and then transferred the new viruses to new ferrets. Soon the viruses evolved to become better at replicating in the ferrets.
University Communications