title: Updating strategies for isolating and discovering giant viruses.
abstract: Almost fifteen years ago, the discovery of Acanthamoeba polyphaga mimivirus, the first giant virus, changed how we define a virus. It was discovered incidentally in a process of isolating Legionella sp. from environmental samples in the context of pneumonia epidemics using a co-culture system with Acanthamoeba. Since then, much effort and improvement has been put into the original technique. In addition to the known families of Mimiviridae and Marseilleviridae, four new proposed families of giant viruses have been isolated: Pandoravirus, Pithovirus, Faustovirus and Mollivirus. Major improvements were based on enrichment systems, targeted use of antibiotics and high-throughput methods. The most recent development, using flow cytometry for isolation and presumptive identification systems, opens a path to large environmental surveys that may discover new giant virus families in new protozoa supports used for culture support.
authors.affiliation: Aix-Marseille Univ., Unité de Recherche sur les Maladies Infectieuses et Tropicales Emergentes (URMITE), UM63 CNRS 7278 IRD 198 INSERM U1095, Facultés de Médecine et de Pharmacie, Marseille, France.
authors.forename: Jacques Yaacoub Bou
authors.initials: JYB
authors.lastname: Khalil
authors.affiliation: Aix-Marseille Univ., Unité de Recherche sur les Maladies Infectieuses et Tropicales Emergentes (URMITE), UM63 CNRS 7278 IRD 198 INSERM U1095, Facultés de Médecine et de Pharmacie, Marseille, France.
authors.forename: Julien
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Andreani
authors.affiliation: Aix-Marseille Univ., Unité de Recherche sur les Maladies Infectieuses et Tropicales Emergentes (URMITE), UM63 CNRS 7278 IRD 198 INSERM U1095, Facultés de Médecine et de Pharmacie, Marseille, France; Institut Hospitalo-Universitaire (IHU) Méditerranée Infection, Pôle des Maladies Infectieuses et Tropicales Clinique et Biologique, Fédération de Bactériologie-Hygiène-Virologie, Centre Hospitalo-Universitaire Timone, Assistance Publique - Hôpitaux de Marseille, Marseille, France. Electronic address: bernard.la-scola@univ-amu.fr.
authors.forename: Bernard
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: La Scola
mesh_terms: D000048:Acanthamoeba / Q000821:virology*; D000935:Antifungal Agents / Q000494:pharmacology; D005434:Flow Cytometry / Q000379:methods*; D016679:Genome, Viral / Q000235:genetics; D000072139:Giant Viruses / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D056686:Mimiviridae / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification; D010802:Phylogeny
chemical_list: D000935:Antifungal Agents