Perspectives
Nature Reviews Microbiology 6, 315-319 (April 2008) | doi:10.1038/nrmicro1858
Opinion: Redefining viruses: lessons from Mimivirus
See also: Correspondence by Roland Wolkowicz & Moselio Schaechter. | Author's reply from Didier Raoult & Patrick Forterre.
Didier Raoult1 & Patrick Forterre2 About the authors
Abstract
Viruses are the most abundant living entities and probably had a major role in the evolution of life, but are still defined using negative criteria. Here, we propose to divide biological entities into two groups of organisms: ribosome-encoding organisms, which include eukaryotic, archaeal and bacterial organisms, and capsid-encoding organisms, which include viruses. Other replicons (for example, plasmids and viroids) can be termed 'orphan replicons'. Based on this suggested classification system, we propose a new definition for a virus — a capsid-encoding organism that is composed of proteins and nucleic acids, self-assembles in a nucleocapsid and uses a ribosome-encoding organism for the completion of its life cycle.
Author affiliations
- Didier Raoult is at the Unité des Rickettsies, IRD-CNRS UMR 6236, IFR-48, Faculté de Médecine, 27 Bd Jean Moulin, 13385 Marseille, France.
- Patrick Forterre is at the Institut Pasteur, 25 rue du Docteur Roux, 75015 Paris1, France, and the University Paris Sud, Institut de Génétique et Microbiologie, CNRS, UMR 8626 IRF-115, Centre d'Orsay, 91405 Orsay, France.
Correspondence to: Didier Raoult1 Email: didier.raoult@gmail.com
Published online 3 March 2008
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