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Marine viruses are defined by their habitat as viruses that are found in marine environments, that is, in the saltwater of seas or oceans or the brackish water of coastal estuaries. Viruses are small infectious agents that can only replicate inside the living cells of a host organism , because they need the replication machinery of the host to ...
Marine viruses. Virus-host interactions in the marine ecosystem, including viral infection of bacteria, phytoplankton and fish [30. A virus is a small infectious ...
Marine life, sea life or ocean life is the collective ecological communities that encompass all aquatic animals, plants, algae, fungi, protists, single-celled microorganisms and associated viruses living in the saline water of marine habitats, either the sea water of marginal seas and oceans, or the brackish water of coastal wetlands, lagoons ...
Viruses are now considered to play key roles in marine ecosystems by controlling microbial community dynamics, host metabolic status, and biogeochemical cycling via lysis of hosts. [41] [42] [44] [45] A giant marine virus CroV infects and causes the death by lysis of the marine zooflagellate Cafeteria roenbergensis. [46]
The name "marnaviridae" is based on its genome type (RNA virus - rnaviridae), together with the prefix "ma" being derived from the Latin word mare (sea).[10]The family was proposed following the discovery of an RNA virus (HaRNAV) that infects H. akashiwo off of the coast of British Columbia, which was the first report of a single-stranded RNA virus capable of causing cell lysis in phytoplankton.
Moreover, it was not until the 1990s that marine viruses were found to have the ability to be potentially pathogenic towards marine organisms. [14] The first diatom virus was identified and isolated, and characterized from the Ariake Sea of Japan in 2004 and was classified as Rhizosolenia setigera RNA virus (RsRNAV). [15]
However, many of the viruses infecting phytoplankton, in particular eukaryotic algae, can be found in members of the family phycodnaviridae, a diverse family of large icosahedral viruses with clear importance in their respective aquatic environments. [30] Additionally, many of these viruses may be classified as Giant Viruses. [29]
Most marine viruses are bacteriophages, which are harmless to plants and animals, but are essential to the regulation of saltwater and freshwater ecosystems. [ 56 ] : 5 They infect and destroy bacteria and archaea in aquatic microbial communities, and are the most important mechanism of recycling carbon in the marine environment.