Weynberg Karen D, Allen Michael J, Wilson William H
Australian Institute of Marine Science, PMB 3, Townsville, Queensland 4810, Australia.
Plymouth Marine Laboratory, Prospect Place, Plymouth PL1 3DH, UK.
Viruses. 2017 Mar 15;9(3):43. doi: 10.3390/v9030043.
Viruses play a crucial role in the marine environment, promoting nutrient recycling and biogeochemical cycling and driving evolutionary processes. Tiny marine phytoplankton called prasinophytes are ubiquitous and significant contributors to global primary production and biomass. A number of viruses (known as prasinoviruses) that infect these important primary producers have been isolated and characterised over the past decade. Here we review the current body of knowledge about prasinoviruses and their interactions with their algal hosts. Several genes, including those encoding for glycosyltransferases, methyltransferases and amino acid synthesis enzymes, which have never been identified in viruses of eukaryotes previously, have been detected in prasinovirus genomes. The host organisms are also intriguing; most recently, an immunity chromosome used by a prasinophyte in response to viral infection was discovered. In light of such recent, novel discoveries, we discuss why the cellular simplicity of prasinophytes makes for appealing model host organism-virus systems to facilitate focused and detailed investigations into the dynamics of marine viruses and their intimate associations with host species. We encourage the adoption of the prasinophyte and its associated viruses as a model host-virus system for examination of cellular and molecular processes in the marine environment.
病毒在海洋环境中发挥着至关重要的作用，促进养分循环和生物地球化学循环，并推动进化过程。微小的海洋浮游植物绿藻门藻无处不在，是全球初级生产和生物量的重要贡献者。在过去十年中，已经分离并鉴定了一些感染这些重要初级生产者的病毒（称为绿藻病毒）。在这里，我们综述了关于绿藻病毒及其与藻类宿主相互作用的现有知识。在绿藻病毒基因组中检测到了几个基因，包括那些编码糖基转移酶、甲基转移酶和氨基酸合成酶的基因，这些基因以前从未在真核生物病毒中被鉴定过。宿主生物也很有趣；最近，发现了一种绿藻门藻用于应对病毒感染的免疫染色体。鉴于这些最新的新发现，我们讨论了为什么绿藻门藻的细胞简单性使其成为有吸引力的模型宿主 - 病毒系统，有助于对海洋病毒动态及其与宿主物种的密切关联进行有针对性和详细的研究。我们鼓励采用绿藻门藻及其相关病毒作为模型宿主 - 病毒系统，以研究海洋环境中的细胞和分子过程。
