WIRED Staff
Science

Slideshow: Doctors Race to ID Killer Virus

Researchers are narrowing the search for the cause of SARS, but two more bits of information are needed to solve the case. The next step will be to develop a test to diagnose the disease before symptoms develop, allowing doctors to slow its spread. By Kristen Philipkoski.
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Professor Malik Peiris, the chief virologist at the University of Hong Kong, stands in front of a projection of a virus infected cell at Queen Mary Hospital in Hong Kong on April 8. Evidence suggests that a new strain of a virus linked to the common cold is the main cause of the strange pneumonia that has killed more than 100 people around the world. Scientists who studied 50 patients with severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) from five outbreak clusters said they believe it is a new member of the coronavirus family, best known as a cause of the common cold.Bobby Yip/Reuters

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Office workers and pedestrians wear surgical masks in an attempt to protect themselves from sever acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, in Hong Kong. SARS has infected more than 2,600 people worldwide and killed at least 104, most of them in mainland China and Hong Kong, with others deaths in Canada, Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia.

AP Photo/Lo Sai Hung