Open AccessMany ways to make an influenza virus – review of influenza virus reverse genetics methods
Author(s) -
Engelhardt Othmar G.
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
influenza and other respiratory viruses
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.743
H-Index - 57
eISSN - 1750-2659
pISSN - 1750-2640
DOI - 10.1111/j.1750-2659.2012.00392.x
Subject(s) - reverse genetics , virology , virus , biology , influenza a virus , context (archaeology) , genome , human influenza , surprise , genetics , covid-19 , gene , medicine , infectious disease (medical specialty) , paleontology , disease , pathology , psychology , social psychology
Methods to introduce targeted mutations into a genome or, in the context of virology, into a virus are subsumed under the term reverse genetics (RG). Influenza viruses are important human pathogens that continue to surprise us. The development of RG for influenza viruses has greatly expanded our knowledge about influenza virus and enabled researchers to generate influenza viruses with rationally designed genotypes. Currently, a wide array of influenza virus RG methods is available. These can all be traced to fundamental principles essential in any RG system for negative‐strand RNA viruses. This review gives an overview of these principles and of the multitude of RG methods, categorising them by technical characteristics.