Scientists Discover Nearly 200,000 Kinds of Ocean Viruses

[Strange]

Quote

despite the staggering abundance of marine viruses — and the key role that these infectious agents seem to play in global processes like the carbon cycle — scientists still know relatively little about the variety of viruses that are out there. In 2015 a team documented 5,476 distinct kinds of viruses in the ocean. In 2016 the same team updated its count to 15,222.

But in a study published today in Cell, that number skyrockets to 195,728 distinct viral populations, a more than twelvefold increase.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/scientists-discover-nearly-200000-kinds-of-ocean-viruses-20190425/

[beecee]

Interesting article, particularly with regards to the carbon cycle and potential tweaking.

the following quote illustrates one of the controversial aspects of this find imo...

"Defining a viral “species” is controversial, as viruses reproduce asexually and frequently swap DNA with one another and their hosts. Because viruses don’t contain the necessary machinery to replicate independently, some biologists do not consider viruses even fully “alive.”

Hmmmm. Any comments from those educated in this field of study?

[Strange]

Just now, beecee said:

Interesting article, particularly with regards to the carbon cycle and potential tweaking.

the following quote illustrates one of the controversial aspects of this find imo...

"Defining a viral “species” is controversial, as viruses reproduce asexually and frequently swap DNA with one another and their hosts. Because viruses don’t contain the necessary machinery to replicate independently, some biologists do not consider viruses even fully “alive.”

Hmmmm. Any comments from those educated in this field of study?

I was also going to mention the difficulty it describes of how a "population" is defined for something like viruses. The same applies to all species, where we apply artificial boundaries, but is more extreme in the case of viruses and many single celled organisms where horizontal gene transfer is important (often mediated by viruses!)