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HALLMARK GENES. “However, a small group of virus hallmark genes that encode key proteins involved in genome replication and virion formation, most notably capsid proteins, are represented in a broad variety of elements, comprising a substantial fraction of the edges in the evolutionary network. Virus hallmark genes do not have obvious ancestors in cellular life forms, suggesting that some types of virus-like elements evolved at a precellular stage of the evolution of life.” https://lnkd.in/eU7uHHB View in LinkedIn

UNIT PARADIGM SHIFTS. “Similarly, before metagenomic tools allowed us to see the prokaryotic world, classical biology held that individual organisms are the fundamental units of ecology, of evolution, and of biodiversity, and their evolutionary history could be explained by arranging them into objectively real, lineage-defined groups, with the groups composed into a single-rooted tree.” https://lnkd.in/ewnQ9Vg View in LinkedIn

BORROWED GENES. “Viruses with large genomes contain numerous genes acquired from the hosts at different stages of evolution.” https://lnkd.in/eU7uHHB View in LinkedIn

GENE SWAPS. “This evolutionary network apparently emerged owing to extensive gene exchange, often between widely different elements, as well as parallel acquisition of homologous genes from the hosts.” https://lnkd.in/eU7uHHB View in LinkedIn

TANGLED WEB. “However, viruses and other selfish genetic elements form a complex network of evolutionary relationships in which genomes are linked through different sets of shared genes.” https://lnkd.in/eU7uHHB View in LinkedIn

NO CONSERVED GENES. “Viruses and related genetic elements do not share a single common ancestor: indeed, there are no genes that would be conserved in all or even in the majority of viral genomes.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.12728/full View in LinkedIn

TURBO-EVOLUTION. “Viral genes typically evolve much faster than genes of cellular organisms, and as a result, most of the genetic diversity on earth is probably concentrated in the virus world.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.12728/full View in LinkedIn

WOW. “The overall number of distinct genes present in the genomes of selfish elements appears to substantially exceed the number of genes in all cellular life forms.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.12728/full View in LinkedIn

UNPARALLELED DIVERSITY. “The virus world displays an enormous diversity of genome structures and sizes (viral genomes consist of single-stranded (ss) or double-stranded (ds) RNA or DNA and range in size from less than 2 kb to over 2 Mb), replication and expression mechanisms, and virion structure.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.12728/full View in LinkedIn

IN ALMOST ALL LIFE. “Viruses and/or other selfish elements, such as transposons and plasmids, parasitize or enter symbiotic relationships with all cellular life forms, with the possible exception of some extremely reduced intracellular parasites.” https://lnkd.in/eU7uHHB View in LinkedIn