smallpox

TWiV 478: A pox on your horse

1 Comment / This Week in Virology / By

The TWiV team explains how infectious horsepox virus – likely the ancestor of smallpox vaccines – was recovered from chemically synthesized DNA fragments. <span data-mce-type=”bookmark” style=”display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;” class=”mce_SELRES_start”></span>&lt;span data-mce-type=”bookmark” style=”display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;” class=”mce_SELRES_start”&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&amp;lt;span data-mce-type=”bookmark” style=”display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;” class=”mce_SELRES_start”&amp;gt;&amp;lt;/span&amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;span data-mce-type=”bookmark” …

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Virologists, start your poliovirus destruction!

16 Comments / Basic virology, Commentary, Information / By

I have worked on poliovirus for over thirty-six years, first as a posdoctoral fellow with David Baltimore in 1979, and then in my laboratory at Columbia University. The end of that research commences this year with the destruction of my stocks of polioviruses. In 2015 there were 70 reported cases of poliomyelitis caused by wild …

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Treatment of Ebola virus infection with brincidofovir

29 Comments / Basic virology, Information / By

The Liberian man who was diagnosed with Ebola virus infection after traveling to Dallas, Texas, was treated with an antiviral drug called brincidofovir. This drug had originally been developed to treat infections with DNA-containing viruses. Why was it used to treat an Ebola virus infection? Brincidofovir (illustrated) is a modified version of an antiviral drug …

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Should variola virus, the agent of smallpox, be destroyed?

26 Comments / Basic virology, Information / By

Later this month (May 2014) the World Health Assembly will decide whether to destroy the remaining stocks of variola virus – the agent of smallpox – or to allow continued research on the virus at WHO-approved laboratories. After the eradication of smallpox in 1980, the World Health Organization called for destruction of known remaining stocks …

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