We found a contig (assembly of DNA fragments) that appeared to contain two genes, one derived from DNA viruses, one from RNA viruses.
We
found a contig (assembly of DNA fragments) that appeared to contain two
genes, one derived from DNA viruses, one from RNA viruses. At first we
didn’t believe it. I didn’t believe it at all. I told the graduate
student to go back and do it again! We confirmed this result and found
the whole genome of this ‘RNA-DNA hybrid virus’ in not only samples from
Boiling Springs Lake, but also in numerous other metagenomic samples.
This result was particularly surprising because it was thought that DNA
and RNA viruses do not recombine with each other. We showed that they
clearly do. That’s really the big breakthrough that we made; it raises
very important issues for the evolution of viruses and the emergence of
new viruses.
