Tom Hill's paper entitled, "Baculovirus molecular evolution via gene turnover and recurrent positive selection of key genes" is out in the Journal of Virology. Here's a short blurb:
Most viral evolutionary studies focus on RNA viruses. While these viruses cause many human and animal diseases, it leaves us with a lesser understanding of how DNA viruses adapt to hosts and how the host responds to these pathogens. In this paper, we focus on the evolution of baculovirus, a group of insect-infecting DNA viruses, many of which have been used in biocontrol. We find that most the genome is under purifying selection, with only a few key genes evolving adaptively. Our results provide a glimpse into how DNA viruses differ from RNA viruses in their evolutionary dynamics and identifies genes key to DNA virus adaptation, improving our understanding of how this group of pathogens evolves.
