Cauliflower mosaic virus reacts immediately when aphids feed on the host plant, and this boosts its chances of being taken up and transmitted by the insects to a new plant.

The bacterium Escherichia coli possesses a permissive cytoplasmic environment and the requisite molecular machinery to support the propagation of prions.

Predicting the pandemic potential of influenza viruses from genetic sequence data could transform pandemic risk assessment but progress towards this goal will require the integration of experimental work, computational tools, and virus surveillance.

The pattern of past Ebola outbreaks is indicative of an effective reproductive ratio of less than 1, which can lead to the generation of a range of outbreak sizes consistent with the scale of the ongoing epidemic.

A lack of ADAM10-mediated shedding increases prion protein levels at the plasma membrane and promotes the generation of pathological prion proteins, which accelerates prion disease in mice.

A novel mouse model of immunization against Plasmodium chabaudi involving infectious mosquito bites and drug-treatment elicits protection against blood-stage malaria parasites, and shows that protection is not necessarily life cycle stage-specific.

Influenza transmission among ferrets correlates strongly with transmission among humans, so the ferret model for influenza transmission is a valid tool for pandemic potential in humans.

Deleterious mutations slow down flu's antigenic evolution, make it more punctuated in nature, and reduce the virus's genetic diversity.

A near-infrared light-stimulable optogenetic platform enables remote and wireless manipulation of calcium signaling and immune responses both in vitro and in vivo to achieve tailored function.

Genetics of a canine transmissible tumour show how the world’s oldest cancer “metastasised” through the global dog population – and captured, maintained and rearranged its mitochondrial DNA along the way.