An immunodeficient individual has been excreting poliovirus in his stool for 28 years. Such chronic excreters pose a threat to the poliovirus eradication program. Since its inception in 1988 by the World Health Organization, the poliovirus eradication program has relied on the use of the infectious, attenuated vaccine strains produced ...

When I became Peter Palese's first Ph.D. student in 1976, his laboratory at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in New York City was in dire need of shelves. The laboratory benches (pictured) had no room for storing the many bottles of reagents that I was beginning to generate. When I told Peter ...

On episode #352 of the science show This Week in Virology, Vincent meets up with Michele Banks in Washington, DC to discuss her career as a creator of science-themed art. You can find TWiV #352 at www.microbe.tv/twiv.

On episode #351 of the science show This Week in Virology, the Masters of the ScienTWIVic Universe discuss a novel poxvirus isolate from an immunosuppressed patient, H1N1 and the gain-of-function debate, and attenuation of dengue virus by recoding the genome. You can find TWiV #351 at www.microbe.tv/twiv.

Image credit The individuals who believe that certain types of gain-of-function experiments should not be done because they are too dangerous (including Lipsitch, Osterholm, Wain-Hobson,) cite the 1977 influenza virus H1N1 strain as an example of a laboratory accident that has led to a global epidemic. A new analysis shows ...