Algal Viruses Diversity

A special issue of Diversity (ISSN 1424-2818). This special issue belongs to the section "Microbial Diversity and Culture Collections".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 August 2020) | Viewed by 2857

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Biology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada
Interests: environmental virology; algal-virus ecology and biology; host–virus infection dynamics; virus diversity; ocean biogeochemistry

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Most of us will agree by now that viruses are the most abundant biological entities on Earth. Within viruses, research on algal viruses has gained momentum in recent years, revealing remarkable morphological and phenotypic virion characteristics, and an enormous genetic and metabolic diversity harboured within viral genomes. Importantly, algal viruses are now recognised as major players in global ecological, biogeochemical and co-evolutionary processes. Further, although most of the genes in algal viruses are with an unknown as of yet function, in some viruses, genes involved in specific metabolic pathways such as lipid and carbohydrate biosynthesis have been identified. In addition, a relatively recent and exciting field of research now also focuses on the applied potential of algal viruses, specifically as it relates to harmful algal blooms. 

The diversity of algal viruses goes beyond their genetic and metabolic potential. They are diverse with regards to the habitat that they are associated with (i.e., marine, freshwater, and terrestrial), and the host organism that they infect; from small microalgae such as coccolithophores, diatoms, and chlorella, to large, habitat-forming macroalgae such as seaweeds and kelps.

To a large extent, many of the recent discoveries in environmental virology are made possible because of advances in next-generation sequencing technologies and bioinformatics methods, which allow for direct sequencing of novel viruses from their natural environment. This expands the knowledge we have gained traditionally from sequencing the genomes of virus isolates in culture.

This Special Issue provides a platform to highlight recent breakthroughs in our understanding of algal virus diversity, in either ecologically important model systems studied in the laboratory or algal viruses studied in their natural or seminatural setting. Research on the diversity of novel, recently discovered algal viruses is particularly welcomed.

Dr. Jozef I. Nissimov
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • Algal viruses
  • Genetic diversity
  • Functional diversity
  • Metabolic diversity
  • Marine
  • Freshwater
  • Terrestrial
  • Co-evolution
  • Horizontal gene transfer
  • Auxiliary metabolic genes

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

11 pages, 449 KiB  
Article
Novel Protocol for Estimating Viruses Specifically Infecting the Marine Planktonic Diatoms
by Yuji Tomaru and Kei Kimura
Diversity 2020, 12(6), 225; https://doi.org/10.3390/d12060225 - 4 Jun 2020
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2527
Abstract
Since their discovery, at least 15 diatom viruses have been isolated and characterised using a culture method with two cycles of extinction dilution. However, the method is time consuming and laborious, and it isolates only the most dominant virus in a water sample. [...] Read more.
Since their discovery, at least 15 diatom viruses have been isolated and characterised using a culture method with two cycles of extinction dilution. However, the method is time consuming and laborious, and it isolates only the most dominant virus in a water sample. Recent studies have suggested inter-species host specificity of diatom viruses. Here, we describe a new protocol to estimate previously unrecognised host-virus relationships. Host cell cultures after inoculation of natural sediment pore water samples were obtained before complete lysis. The proliferated viral genomes in the host cells were amplified using degenerate primer pairs targeting protein replication regions of single-stranded RNA (ssRNA) and single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) viruses, and then sequenced. Diverse ssRNA virus types within known diatom virus group were detected from inoculated Chaetoceros tenuissimus and C. setoensis cells. A previously unknown ssDNA virus type was detected in inoculated C. tenuissimus cells, but not in C. setoensis cells. Despite the possible protocol biases, for example non-specific adsorptions of virions onto the host cells, the present method helps to estimate the viruses infectious to a single host species. Further improvements to this protocol targeting the proliferated viral genomes might reveal unexpected diatom–virus ecological relationships. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Algal Viruses Diversity)
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