Large and giant DNA viruses of the phylum Nucleocytoviricota have a profound influence on
the ecology and evolution of planktonic eukaryotes. Recently, various Nucleocytoviricota …

The work of Carl Woese and his colleagues of the Urbana University has been one of the
most important breakthroughs in biology in the last century (for historical sketches, see Refs …

A long-shared evolutionary history is congruent with the multiple roles played by purinergic
signaling in viral infection, replication and host responses that can assist or hinder viral …

A fundamental concept in evolutionary theory is the last universal common ancestor (LUCA)
from which all living organisms. While some authors have suggested a relatively complex …

The tree of life (TOL) is a powerful framework to depict the evolutionary history of cellular
organisms through time, from our microbial origins to the diversification of multicellular …

During evolution, viruses had to adapt to an increasingly complex environment of eukaryotic
cells. Viral proteins that need to enter the cell nucleus or associate with nucleoli possess …

Mobile genetic elements (MGEs), especially viruses, have a major impact on microbial
communities. Methanogenic archaea play key environmental and economical roles, being …

The evolutionary origin of the genome remains elusive. Here, I hypothesize that its first
iteration, the protogenome, was a multi-ribozyme RNA. It evolved, likely within liposomes …

Viruses infect and affect all domains of life, playing roles as drivers for evolution, diversity,
and global geochemical cycling. Because viruses evolve with and depend on their hosts for …

The rebuttal of the prokaryote–eukaryote dichotomy and the elaboration of the three
domains concept by Carl Woese and colleagues has been a breakthrough in biology. With …