What are the current “hot” areas of research in Virology?
The answer to this question is very broad, but some research areas and themes are emerging as major new directions in the field. With our growing understanding of how the human immune response functions, many scientists are focusing their efforts on viral pathogenesis, which explores how viruses cause disease. While many employ animal models for such research, excellent viral pathogenesis studies also can be done using cells grown in tissue culture. Current pathogenesis studies now commonly use information from both the viral and host genomes to dissect specific determinants of viral virulence. A key goal for these types of studies is to use information gathered from a better understanding of disease pathogenesis to develop improved antiviral drugs and vaccines.
