The origin of life on Earth becomes even more fascinating and complex as we peer into the mysterious world of viruses. Said ...

Scientists generally agree that eukaryotes, the domain of life whose cells contain nuclei and that includes almost all multicellular organisms, originated from a process involving the symbiotic union ...

Microbiologists have long known that ancient, inactive viruses known as cryptic prophages can insert their genetic material into bacterial DNA. These genetic fragments allow bacteria to use ...

This article originally appeared on Undark. Pharmacies in the nation of Georgia have something ours don’t: vials of viruses in neat rows. People swallow or gargle the brews to combat routine bacterial ...

As humans alter the planet’s climate and ecosystems, scientists are looking to Earth’s history to help predict what may unfold from climate change. To this end, massive ice structures like glaciers ...

How did viruses evolve? Are they a streamlined form of something that existed long ago, or an ultimate culmination of smaller genetic elements joined together? Aa Aa Aa The evolutionary history of ...

The idea that a single-celled bacterium can defend itself against viruses in a similar way as the 1.8-trillion-cell human immune system is still “mind-blowing” for molecular biologist Joshua Modell of ...

Peering through his microscope in 1910, Franco-Canadian microbiologist Félix d'Hérelle noticed some "clear spots" in his bacterial cultures, an anomaly that turned out to be viruses preying on the ...

Infectious disease researchers have identified Pteropine orthoreovirus (PRV), an emerging bat-borne orthoreovirus, in archived throat swab samples and virus cultures from five patients in Bangladesh ...

Researchers at Columbia Engineering have built a cancer therapy that makes bacteria and viruses work as a team. In a study published today in Nature Biomedical Engineering, the Synthetic Biological ...

Penn State scientists uncovered an ancient bacterial defense where dormant viral DNA helps bacteria fight new viral threats. The enzyme PinQ flips bacterial genes to create protective proteins that ...