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Are viruses considered to be living organisms? Why or why not?

2 Answers

7 votes

Answer:

A virus isn’t considered living because it doesn’t need to consume energy to survive, nor is it able to regulate its own temperature. Unlike living organisms that meet their energy needs by metabolic processes that supply energy-rich units of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the energy currency of life, viruses can survive on nothing. In theory, a virus can drift around indefinitely until it contacts the right kind of cell for it to bind to and infect, thus creating more copies itself

Step-by-step explanation:

I hope this helps!

User Dcow
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6 votes

Answer:

no

Step-by-step explanation:

They lack many characteristics that living organisms have. For example, they need to invade a host in order to replicate.

User Thomas Stringer
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