Evolution: the long evolutionary reach of viruses.
The structure of a phage capsid protein provides good evidence this phage shares ancestry with an animal virus. In this and similar cases, either the viral lineages predate the emergence of the three contemporary domains of life, or viruses have been leaping the phylogenetic chasms that separate the domains.
Hendrix
R W
RW
Department of Biological Sciences, Pittsburgh Bacteriophage Institute, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh 15260, USA. rhx@vms.cis.pitt.edu
D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D002213:Capsid / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D008958:Models, Molecular; D010802:Phylogeny; D011487:Protein Conformation; D014780:Viruses / Q000235:genetics*