Genome chromatinization in giant double-stranded DNA viruses

Ying Liu (1) , Mart Krupovic (1)

1 Virologie des archées - Archaeal Virology

Giant viruses have extravagantly large double-stranded (ds)DNA genomes that are packaged into exceedingly complex virions. In two recent papers, Liu et al. and Valencia-Sánchez, Abini-Agbomson et al. show that some giant viruses encode unique histone doublets, which form nucleosomes remarkably similar to those found across the eukaryotic domain of life.

Keywords: viral genome packaging; icosahedral capsid; virus evolution; chromatin; family Marseilleviridae; phylum Nucleocytoviricota (NCLDV)

Domains: Virology

Ying Liu, Mart Krupovic. Genome chromatinization in giant double-stranded DNA viruses. Trends in Biochemical Sciences, 2022, 47 (1), pp.3-5. ⟨10.1016/j.tibs.2021.10.002⟩. ⟨pasteur-03698232⟩