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I know what viruses are. They replicate only inside the living cells, and so on, and so on.

I just interesting maybe there is some progress in this field. I don't know exactly, but I suppose before invention of the nutrient agar microorganisms were cultivated on substrates like eggs, potatoes, meat etc. Perhaps there is the same story for viruses.

Bird
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    No. A virus is a small infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of other organisms. -Wikipedia – Tyto alba Feb 19 '17 at 19:34
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    +1'd and it doesn't seem like a homework question. It seems the OP want to tell they knows virus doesn't grow if not in living cell- but if there is any latter-discovery of any virus-like particle growing outside living cell. – Always Confused Feb 20 '17 at 16:41
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    I agree with @AlwaysConfused - I see no reason to close or put this question on hold, it does not seem like a homework question, especially after the OP's recent edits I would suggest the hold be removed. – Bryan Krause Feb 21 '17 at 20:05
  • I don't have a lot of experience in this field to give a full answer, but just for the OP's information, a couple things. First, viruses depend on many key proteins from their hosts. To have any possibility of growing a virus outside a cell, you would have to provide all these proteins, plus the proteins that support/regulate those proteins, a source of ATP, etc. Soon the list of ingredients is essentially just a cell, and (many) cells are fairly easy to grow, so I don't think there is a lot of motivation to finding a way to cultivate a virus outside of a cell, and it would take a lot of work. – Bryan Krause Feb 21 '17 at 20:09
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    Voted to reopen. I was reading a paper from the 30's which claimed to cultivate Vaccinia in the absence of living cells. However a later paper admitted that they couldn't be sure there were no living cells in the media. Of course, given what we now know, contamination with life cells seems most likely. – canadianer Feb 22 '17 at 00:46
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    It depends. Some viruses (like Vaccinia used above) are highly complex and would need a cell to be synthesized (with today's tech). If you take simple viruses, say Poliovirus, you could make the RNA and that alone could be infectious if placed in a cell. This isn't a true virus though, more of a viroid. That being said, take PCV, the single protein will self-assemble and incorporate vDNA, while it might not have been done, this could be theoretically be made in vitro. – Artem Feb 22 '17 at 00:49
  • PCR may be called as a quite similar situation where outside the cell a piece of nucleic acid replicated. – Always Confused Feb 22 '17 at 15:06
  • @Artem Very helpful information. – Always Confused Feb 22 '17 at 15:08

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