Questions on viral population biology to complete dengue puzzle

Abstract : The mechanisms driving the current evolution of dengue remain unclear. We argue that disregarding the population biology of viruses has been a limiting factor, and present a hypothetical framework based on viral population biology. This allows us to pinpoint three flaws that need to be addressed: (1) a large underestimation of the viral polymorphism within populations; (2) a disregard of viral loci other than that encoding the antigenic envelope; and (3) the neglect of host-driven selection, especially that of vector-driven selection.