"It's a bell-shaped curve of disease resistance versus host tolerance," said Floyd (ski) Chilton, senior author on the paper and director of the UArizona Precision Nutrition and Wellness Initiative at the university. "In other words, this enzyme is trying to kill the virus, but at a certain point it is released in such high amounts that things head in a really bad direction, destroying the patient's cell membranes and thereby contributing to multiple organ failure and death."