Emerging Microbes, Infections and Spillovers, 2nd Edition

A special issue of Viruses (ISSN 1999-4915). This special issue belongs to the section "Animal Viruses".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 May 2025 | Viewed by 604

Special Issue Editors

1. Department of Basic Veterinary Sciences, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Helsinki, 00790 Helsinki, Finland
2. Department of Virology, Medicum, University of Helsinki, 00290 Helsinki, Finland
3. Department of Tropical Parasitology, Institute of Maritime and Tropical Medicine, Medical University of Gdansk, 81-519 Gdynia, Poland
Interests: genomics; metagenomics; microbiology; bioinformatics; viromics
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Guest Editor
Department of Virology, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
Interests: One Health; microbiology and microbial evolution; zoonoses; emerging infectious diseases
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Guest Editor
Zakład Parazytologii Tropikalnej, Instytut Medycyny Morskiej i Tropikalnej, Gdanski Uniwersytet Medyczny, Gdańsk, Poland
Interests: parasites; helminths; parasite ecology; rodents; next-generation sequencing; PCR bioinformatics; ecology; animal ecology; data analysis; DNA extraction; ecology and evolution; molecular biology; genetics
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Emerging pathogens pose a continuous and significant threat to global health, as evidenced by outbreaks of Ebola and Zika viruses, and more recently, the COVID-19 pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2. These viruses, along with others like avian influenza and MPOX (formerly known as monkeypox), are zoonotic, meaning they can cross species barriers—a characteristic shared by the majority of emerging pathogens. Globalization and industrialization have drastically increased the vulnerability of human and animal populations to both emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases, altering the scale and speed at which outbreaks occur.

As we look to the future, new infectious diseases are expected to remain a major threat to public health worldwide. Many of these diseases are driven by microbes, particularly viruses capable of crossing host species barriers, such as zoonoses, or establishing sustained human-to-human transmission. To effectively detect and control these pathogens, comprehensive studies are required on their reservoirs, vectors, molecular biology, and diagnostics.

Following the success of our previous Special Issue on this theme, we are pleased to invite new manuscript submissions for an upcoming issue. This Special Issue is open to a variety of contributions, including reviews, research articles, and short communications, with a focus on emerging pathogens and viral zoonoses. We welcome topics such as virus discovery, virus–host interactions, pathogenesis, cross-species transmission, virus evolution, reservoirs, and the zoonotic aspects of these diseases, among others.

Dr. Ravi Kant
Dr. Tarja Sironen
Prof. Dr. Maciej Grzybek
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short 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 thoroughly refereed through a single-blind 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 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • emerging infections
  • virus spillovers
  • microbes
  • cross-species transmission
  • virus evolution
  • viral disease
  • virus reservoirs
  • virus–host interaction
  • pathogenesis

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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18 pages, 1097 KiB  
Systematic Review
Assessing the Environmental Drivers of Lassa Fever in West Africa: A Systematic Review
by Natalie A. Davis, Madeline A. Kenyon, Bruno M. Ghersi, Jessica L. Decker Sparks and Jonathon D. Gass, Jr.
Viruses 2025, 17(4), 504; https://doi.org/10.3390/v17040504 - 31 Mar 2025
Viewed by 289
Abstract
The spread of Lassa virus in West Africa is reliant on the abundance and distribution of its rodent host reservoirs. While the impact of environmental change on viral spread has been studied for many zoonotic viruses, there is still a limited understanding of [...] Read more.
The spread of Lassa virus in West Africa is reliant on the abundance and distribution of its rodent host reservoirs. While the impact of environmental change on viral spread has been studied for many zoonotic viruses, there is still a limited understanding of how seasonal impacts, land-use conversion, and biodiversity loss influence the expansion of Lassa virus among reservoirs. This systematic review synthesizes existing research on the association between environmental variables and Lassa virus circulation in West Africa to inform future research, public health interventions, and One Health policy. We searched international and African scientific databases using a set of pre-defined search terms to obtain publications reporting on Lassa virus in West Africa between 1969 and 2023. A total of 9465 articles were retrieved from this search and 70 studies met inclusion criteria for this review. Through systematic data extraction, we identified seasonal precipitation, land-use change, and host expansion as key environmental drivers of Lassa virus in reservoir hosts; however, we also highlight notable gaps in knowledge that limit our current understanding of these complex relationships. This review underscores the need for interdisciplinary research and strategies to mitigate the impacts of environmental change on Lassa virus transmission and protect vulnerable populations in West Africa. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Emerging Microbes, Infections and Spillovers, 2nd Edition)
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