Special Issue "Paleovirology"

Guest Editor
Dr. Anna Marie Skalka
Fox Chase Cancer Center, 333 Cottman Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19111, USA
Website: http://www.fccc.edu/
E-Mail: am_skalka@fccc.edu
Phone: +1 215 728 2490
Fax: +1 215 728 2778
Interests: retroviral DNA integration and gene expression; impact on host cell biology

Dear Colleagues,

With the exception of retroviruses, until very recently it was not possible to trace the evolution of currently circulating viruses further back than a few thousand years. All of this changed in the past decade with increasing availability of the genomic sequences of a variety of organisms, and new computational methods for their annotation and investigation. In the last two years, application of these methods anaalyses have uncovered genomic fossils from ancient relatives of a number of virus families with both DNA and RNA genomes, revealing some to have existed for longer than ~90 million years, the current theoretical limit of such calculations. Such revelations have raised important and fascinating new topics for inquiry: By what mechanism(s) were these viral sequences integrated into their host species genomes? What selective pressures, if any, have led to their maintenance in the host populations? What new information may be gained concerning the organization and evolution of our own genomes and those of other species in our environment?

This special issue of viruses focuses on the emerging field of Paleovirology, and will include articles that summarize the new findings and methods cited above, and well as issues related to some fundamental questions now open for consideration. The search for answers and new knowledge obtained is sure to increase our understanding of both virus and host biology and evolution in the future.

Prof. Dr. Anna Marie Skalka
Guest Editor

Submission

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. Papers will be published continuously (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are refereed through a peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Viruses is an international peer-reviewed Open Access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1200 CHF (Swiss Francs).

• virus fossils
• LINE-facilitated integration
• intrinsic resistance
• virus reservoir species
• selective pressures
• genomic analyses