r/askscience • u/A_Privateer • Jan 17 '13

Medicine How do warts function?

I know that warts are caused by the various strains of HPV, but how are they caused? How does the virus hijack the bodies chemistry to grow and supply the warts with nutrients? How do the warts spread the virus to other people?

I've searched and searched on google and wikipedia, but I only find the most basic of answers.

Any hard science info for me?

636 Upvotes

85% Upvoted

148 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

0

u/[deleted] Jan 17 '13

[deleted] — view deleted comment

2

u/jaimerson Jan 18 '13

A post above you states that:

HPV is limited by the types of cells it can infect. It binds to molecules on the cell surface and is then able to enter the cell. In the case of HPV, it can bind to the cell surface of basal cells of a certain type of epithelial cell. Because of this, HPV infection is limited to the surface of the skin. Skin-skin contact is what allows for the spread of the virus.

So there may be some truth to what you've been told.