Your Patient Has a Fever of 39^oC, Sore Throat, Cough

Multiple Choice

Your patient has a fever of 39^oC, sore throat, cough, and chest pain. You ask her whether she has had pneumococcal vaccine this year, which protects against the the 23 most common strains of the causative bacterium Streptococcus pneumoniae. She says she has not. Your patient has a number of questions that you answer to help her understand the genetics of the organism causing her illness.
-Your patient tells you she didn't get the flu vaccine either because she heard that she would have to get it every year. She doesn't understand why this is that case. You explain that flu viruses have two types of glycoprotein spikes that have a role in flu virus pathogenesis. Every year, minor changes occur in the genes that code for these spikes, resulting in slight changes in their amino acid sequence. These changes to the spikes on the surface of the virus is an example of ________.

A) antigenic variation
B) phase variation
C) quorum sensing
D) two-component regulation
E) gene splicing