Abergel Lab

Research focus

ERC Advanced Grant · 2018

Cells and giant viruses: a win-win co-evolution

The discovery of Mimivirus, the first icosahedral virus visible by light microscopy, was followed by the characterization of many other relatives. Its aquatic relative Megavirus chilensis, has a 1.2 Mb genome and encodes more than 1000 proteins, 2/3 unique to the Mimiviridae. Their infectious cycle is cytoplasmic. During the last 10 years, my laboratory discovered three other giant virus families: -the pandoraviridae, with their unique amphora-shaped 1µm long virion morphologies, genome sizes reaching 3Mb and encoding thousands of proteins, most of which without homologues in the cellular or the viral world – the mollivirus, which was isolated from a 30,000 years old Siberian permafrost…

From the public funding record at EU CORDIS. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.