Shortly after Félix d€™Herelle discovered viruses that infect bacteria in 1917 (also found in 1915 by Twort), he recognized their therapeutic potential for treating infections. The discovery of penicillin in 1928 began the golden age of antibiotics, which pushed aside progress in treating infections with bacteriophages. With the advent of widespread antimicrobial resistance, development of …
Retroviruses have been infecting vertebrates for over 450 million years. Because retroviral DNA integrates into host cell DNA, the vertebrate genome is littered with remnants of these infections. Some of this retroviral DNA has been co-opted by the cell for a variety of beneficial purposes, such as development of the placenta and the control of …
Retroviruses and the placenta, a remarkable relationship Read More »
Each year I inform the students in my Columbia University virology course that all known DNA polymerases – viral or cellular – require a primer to initiate DNA synthesis (it€™s even stated in our textbook, Principles of Virology). This statement is no longer true, as shown by the discovery of two different DNA polymerases that …
A method for making vaccines that induce antibodies against a specific epitope could be used to produce a universal influenza vaccine that would not have to be changed every year.
Infection with yellow fever virus caused the death of a patient 25 years after receiving a kidney transplant, illustrating the difficulties associated with some medical vaccine exemptions. The patient had received a kidney transplant at the age of 58 in February 1993. Nearly 25 years later he was admitted to hospital with two days of …
Michael Rossmann, a leader in the use of X-ray crystallography and cry-electron microscopy to solve the structure of viruses, died on 14 May 2019 at the age of 88.
