How the placenta evolved from an ancient virus
It is also being researched how endogenous retroviruses are part of aging. The very rough idea being that at some point long in past a retrovirus became endogenous and provided a pathway for aging increasing the evolutionary rate of that organism, which would then out-compete most of the immortal organisms with time.<p>Something like:<p><a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20346965/" rel="nofollow">https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20346965/</a>