Talk:Gamma Plague
This thing might get rewritten in the future anyway, but this stuff seems a bit odd. Radiation sickness is caused by damaged protein strands and there is really no "cure" for it other than to either eliminate the mutated cells or repair the protein strands. This article on the other hand seems to suggest that this is simply another type of disease that can be cured by some medication and that can cause "epidemics". Obviously cancer can be cured and probably in 600 years is absolutely no issue (even lung or pancreas), but it's still quite different than any normal illness caused by a virus or a bacteria.
Radiation immunity is also possible (with excellent DNA repair mechanism or cell destruction in mitosis), but DNA exchange probably isn't the best possible way to do that. For example nanobots that monitor the DNA of cells in mitosis would probably work better and probably for every race in the universe.
--Mad Gigerdi Jr. (talk) 22:41, 30 January 2014 (EET)
Possible explanation
You raise good points, this always was a bit weird - a kind of a Star Trek conception of medicine where you can "cure" radiation. Of course, this can be explained by the fact that the Bacterians are a completely different type of species from the rest. Their "genetic assimilation" trait and the fact that the superbacterium in their bodies have the possibility for major genetic restructuring of an individual could mean that, when exposed to certain radiation, there is a possibility of a harmful mutation in the superbacterium which makes the genetic assimilation go wrong, producing some sort of a mutant bacteria that acts as a harmful mutagen, working sort of like FEV in Fallout.
This could be one explanation for the Gamma Plague, why it is a surprise to the Gigerdians and Bacterians (radiation sickness wouldn't be, as it is to be expected) and why it spreads like a disease (it is carried by the mutated bacteria, not radiation).
I guess that could work. Though Bacterians and the superbacterium is another issue, but I think we can let them be as it is.
--Mad Gigerdi Jr. (talk) 23:50, 31 January 2014 (EET)
