Virology
Influenza neuraminidase inhibitors work
By Vincent Racaniello
In the wake of a British Medical Journal article which concludes that Tamiflu has at best a modest effect, many readers have asked if influenza neuraminidase inhibitors function at all. If you'd like a good critique of this study, I suggest reading Paul Revere's analysis at Effect Measure. For our ...
Smallpox in New York City, 1947
By Vincent Racaniello
Millions of New Yorkers were immunized against smallpox within a few weeks in April 1947. The stimulus for this mass immunization was the importation of smallpox by a businessman who had acquired the disease during his travels. While we are in the middle of a massive influenza immunization campaign, it ...
TWiV 63: Melting pot virus
By Vincent Racaniello
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Alan Dove, and Rich Condit On episode 63 of the podcast This Week in Virology, Vincent, Alan, and Rich talk about US government contract for freeze-dried smallpox vaccine, red squirrels in the UK threatened by poxvirus, and Marseillevirus, another DNA virus from amoebae built for comfort and ...
Viruses and journalism: Poliovirus, HIV, and sperm
By Vincent Racaniello
In the summer of 1989, two papers about viruses were published in high-profile journals. One described the engineering of a recombinant poliovirus bearing on its surface an antigen from HIV-1. The second paper claimed that transgenic mice could be made by adding DNA to sperm before using them to fertilize ...
Rhinovirus and zinc part 5: Magnesium is not the culprit
By Vincent Racaniello
If you have been following the results of my experiments on inhibition of rhinovirus replication by ZnCl2, you know that I've been trying to determine why concentrations of the salt higher than 0.1 mM are toxic to HeLa cells. I have found that 0.1 mM ZnCl2 does inhibit rhinovirus plaque ...
