There once was a virus that swallowed a spider. Or a few spider genes, anyway. Researchers studying WO, a virus that infects a bacteria found in most spiders and insects, found a surprising collection of animal-like snippets in the virus's DNA. This spider-bacteria-virus-spider turducken was reported Tuesday in Nature Communications.
Viruses — genes cobbled together from bits of genetic material, wrapped in a protein envelope — are such intriguing little buggers that some argue they should be considered alive. The prevailing thought used to be that viruses were just made up of scraps of genetic material shed from living things. But the discovery of giant, ancient viruses suggests that today's contagions might actually have evolved from whole cells that shrank down, shedding the bits and bobs they didn't need while surviving and propagating within infected hosts.
