Wild poliovirus has been detected in the sewers of Brazil and Israel. Fortunately, no cases of poliomyelitis have been reported in either country. Why is poliovirus present in these countries and what are the implications for the eradication effort? Wild type poliovirus (e.g. not vaccine-derived virus) was detected in sewage ...

On episode #290 of the science show This Week  in Virology, Vincent meets up with Janet Butel and Rick Lloyd at Baylor College of Medicine to talk about their work on polyomaviruses and virus induced stress. You can find TWiV #290 at www.microbe.tv/twiv.

The gain of function experiments in which avian influenza H5N1 virus was provided the ability to transmit by aerosol among ferrets were met with substantial outrage from both the press and even some scientists; scenarios of lethal viruses escaping from the laboratory and killing millions proliferated (see examples here and ...

On episode #289 of the science show This Week in Virology, Vinny and the capsids answer listener questions about the definition of life, state vaccination laws, the basic science funding problem, viral ecology, inactivation of viruses by pressure, and much more. You can find TWiV #289 at www.microbe.tv/twiv.

Segmented genomes abound in the RNA virus world. They are found in virus particles from different families, and can be double stranded (Reoviridae) or single stranded of (+) (Closteroviridae) or (-) (Orthomyxoviridae) polarity. Our recent discussion of the advantages of a segmented viral genome, compared with monopartitie genomes, generated a good discussion. Another interesting question concerns the ...