TWiV 382: Everyone's a little bit viral

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, Alan Dove and Kathy Spindler

Guests: Nels Elde and Edward Chuong

Nels and Ed join the TWiV team to talk about their observation that regulation of the human interferon response depends on regulatory sequences that were co-opted millions of years ago from endogenous retroviruses.

Links for this episode

• Endogenous retroviruses and regulation of innate immunity (Science)
• Placenta is viral (Nature)
• An ERV that maintains pluripotency of human embryonic stem cells (TWiV 279)
• Letters read on TWiV 382

This episode is sponsored by ASM Agar Art Contest and ASV 2016

Weekly Science Picks

Nels - Don't Get Me Started - Matt GiorgianniAlan - Sun's magnetic field (paper)Dickson - Most realistic dinosaur terrifiesVincent - Top secret!Kathy - Zika virus risk for US 50 cities (paper)Ed - Watching comb jellies poop

Listener Picks

Asal - Lost paper of Gregor MendelDennis - PhysicsGirlJacob - Second (XKCD) and ACI blogger interview

Send your virology questions and comments to twiv@microbe.tv