Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Viruses/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Returning Wikipedians

If you are returning to the project, please add your name here, otherwise you will be removed from our list of participants. -- Thomas888b (Say Hi) 20:53, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for your interest in the project. I think it might be more polite to contact members and former members on their Talk Pages before removing any names; there aren't that many. Graham Colm (talk) 21:16, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Oh. I see from my watchlist, you have. Thanks. Graham Colm (talk) 21:39, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Yep, I added this before the bot sent out my message. Thomas888b (Say Hi) 21:53, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

User:

• ITippy (talk · contribs)
• Scray (talk · contribs)
• GrahamColm (talk · contribs)
• Read-write-services (talk) 22:32, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
• Kingdon (talk · contribs)
• ~ Ciar ~ _(Talk) 19:00, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
• Jarretinha (talk · contribs)
• DiverDave (talk) 16:46, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
• Gorton k (talk) 15:04, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Should we remove people no longer interested now? Thomas888b (Say Hi) 16:23, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I think a month (not yet there) would be a reasonable interval, as long as a removal notice goes on their talk page. I would suggest retaining anyone who has posted on this Talk page in the past 6 months. -- Scray (talk) 16:39, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

The Medicine project recently undertook a similar exercise.[1]. I think we should follow their example and audit contributions to Wikipedia (and not just virus articles) with a cut-off of six-months inactivity on WP for "inactive participants" and twelve-months inactivity on WP for "former participants. Graham Colm (talk) 16:47, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, Could you explain that a little more? -- Thomas888b (Say Hi) 16:50, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Graham: excellent suggestion. Thomas: have a look at the link Graham provided, and Wikipedia:WikiProject_Medicine/Participants. This lists people who signed on at some point as a member of WPMED and are categorized (at time of census-taking) as Active (have edited WP within six months), Inactive (have edited WP in past 6+ to 12 months), or Past (have not edited WP in the past 12 months). -- Scray (talk) 20:16, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Cool, Makes sence now. Possibly thinking of redesigning WP:VIRUS. -- Thomas888b (Say Hi) 19:49, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Heavy plagiarism in Adenovirus infection article

While I was doing some homework for my undergrad micro bio course, I noticed that nearly the entire Adenovirus infection article had been taken from the CDC page on Adenoviruses! Seanthegeek (talk) 18:46, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out - it does appear to be plagiarism. I need to run but will try to address it this evening if no one else has. These infections are important, and this could easily be a good article with some work. -- 20:58, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

This is probably with respect to copyright (or rather, would be if cited, which I fixed). Most work of the US Government is public domain, and if this qualifies, there isn't a copyright issue (see for example {{USGovernment}}). Whether the text is in the right style for wikipedia is another issue, so I'm not saying it is a bad idea to rewrite it, just that I don't think we need to do so for copyright reasons. Kingdon (talk) 22:09, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Kingdon, I hadn't thought about the fact that it is a government work, good point. In my opinion, the current mix of styles the article does it make it rather difficult to read. I would be happy to help with the cleanup, but I am by no measure an expert in microbiology or virology. That said, I would be able to assist with flow, structure, and overall readability. Let me know if there is anything I can do. Also, I don't think your edit for the citation took; I don't see it in the article's history. Seanthegeek (talk) 21:04, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

The edit I was talking about was this one. Kingdon (talk) 00:52, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Help Please

I came across the article Peplomer as part of the work of WP:URA where I am trying to find references for the articles taggged the longest as needing references. A search for references found several mentions of the subject, but more knowledgeable assistance is needed to add a reference (or two) that supports the WP:V and WP:N of the subject and content. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 15:18, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

I managed to find a source for the first sentence and remove one incorrect sentence. It's a stub, so someone with more expertise in this field should be able to find some sources. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:49, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Great! Thanks for your help. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 10:45, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Megalocytivirus

A new editor Fish nerd (talk · contribs) has asked for help at WP:FEEDBACK with Megalocytivirus. The editor has been given some general style advice, but I think it would be helpful if someone who knows a thing or two about viruses would please look it over and encourage this new editor with ideas for expansion and improvement. Thanks, WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:32, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Hi, I have followed this up. Thanks for alerting our attention. Best wishes, Graham. Graham Colm (talk) 21:53, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Disambiguation opinions

Hi. I'd be grateful if editors which an interest in disambiguation could take a look at Tristis and let me know their thoughts on its talk page. Thanks SP-KP (talk) 10:20, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Um I'm totally lost as to why you are asking this. Is it related to a virus? You've lost me. Maybe I'm missing something obvious, please explain. Regards Read-write-services (talk) 23:45, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

See Talk:Tristis, where we're discussing the significance of species epithet disambiguation pages. It doesn't have much to do with viruses, but SP-KP notified all the TOL wikiprojects. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 15:04, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Right! thank you for the clarification, Bob. I'm sorry that I cant really help with this one though. Cheers!Read-write-services (talk) 23:43, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

NCLDV

Just thought I'd mention that a recent publication[2] supports the 4th domain hypothesis. Do we want to begin recognizing that, or not? Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 04:12, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

I've looked at the paper, and I don't see anything conclusive enough to change either NCLDV or Domain in a fundamental way. They mention four possible explanations for their data, and although they dismiss two of them, I'm not sure I find their reasons for doing so convincing without more data. Even leaving those two aside, they identify two possibilities: that they are looking at virus sequences, or that they are looking at non-viruses which are not Archaea, bacteria, or eukaryotes. Unless there is more confirmation that any of this is real, and which of those two (or four) explanations explain it, it all strikes me as rather premature for wikipedia. If you are talking about mimivirus in particular, that seems different. The paper says "The Unknown 2 is peripherally related to the RpoB homolog from the giant Mimivirus (data not shown)" which strikes me as pretty tentative. At least as far as I could tell from a glance at Giant viruses, giant chimeras: The multiple evolutionary histories of Mimivirus genes, the various mimivirus genes are derived from known genes from the 3 domains. Kingdon (talk) 01:52, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

H1N2

the wikipedia article speaks about a new outbreak of H1N2 in Dec.2010 in China. This seems to refer to an old outbreak in 1988 which didn't spread

Gsgs2 (talk) 04:34, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this up (also feel free to WP:Be bold if you feel so inclined). This text originally did refer to the 1988 outbreak, and I've restored that (but with a better source, which was easy to find). Where I'm a bit out of my league is trying to make sense of which cases are worth mentioning and which ones aren't. Why mention the 1988 China cases and not the 2001 cases from the United States or the (pig, not human) 2008–2009 cases from Sweden? As for these supposed 2010–2011 cases in China, I've left it in for the moment, but unless a source can be found, it should be deleted. Could well just be mindless vandalism. Kingdon (talk) 00:54, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Phages

Hi everyone. I am I alone in thinking that bacteriophages bear a striking resemblance to purported nanotechnologic machinery. Nothing new under the sun eh? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.170.216.76 (talk) 10:42, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Channel catfish virus

Could someone please have a look at Channel catfish virus? It is marked as needing a {{taxobox}}, and I don't understand viral classification well enough to add one. There are also some formatting and referencing issues that should ultimately be sorted out; some good sources are cited on the Wikivet page that the page draws on. --Stemonitis (talk) 09:58, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

I have added the taxobox and sorted out some of the formatting issues. Is there free electron micrograph of the virus available? Graham Colm (talk) 17:22, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Origin and evolution of viruses

Despite obvious medical and economic importance of viruses, science is far from stablish a common framework to understand the origin and evolution of viruses. This area of knowledge is experimenting a moment flourishment without precedent, clearly illustrated by the discovery of giant viruses. My Msc. and (unfinished) Ph. D. deal with all these issues (including mutational burden hypothesis, error catastrophe, etc.) and I've collected and organized plenty of information about the subject. But, I think a little help to digest all this information would be very nice!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jarretinha (talk • contribs) 15:46, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

If you want to discuss the evolution of viruses please leave a note and I will get back to you. The literature in this area is a mess but something I agree would be worth adding into WP if we can get it organised. DrMicro (talk) 11:14, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

I really want to discuss this subject and already have the literature somewhat organized chronologically and by underlying hypothesis (which are many). I'm a goal-driven guy, so let's discuss some of it! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jarretinha (talk • contribs) 13:44, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Group D arbovirus (arthropod-borne virus)

Can anyone here help with Group D arbovirus (arthropod-borne virus)? I can't seem to see any reference for the title "Group D arbovirus", and so I can't construct a taxobox. Any assistance would be gratefully received. --Stemonitis (talk) 20:30, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

The arboviruses are not really a proper taxonomical unit. They include a variety of viruses from different taxonomical groups that shared a common transmission mechanism - transfer by arthropods to vertebrates. They were subdivided into subgroups on the basis of serology. With the availability of RNA and DNA genomic sequences, sequence data are the currently preferred method of classification. It is probably worth adding the arbovirus classification in as a note under a heading such as 'Historical classification systems' (or some such) as the term is still in use.DrMicro (talk) 11:36, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Revival

I think my work with this project is finished, unless someone would like me to help you guys implement the {{virusbox}} in the project. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 17:50, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Hi Bob, I have a bot (automatic program to edit wikipedia pages) and worked on virus template boxes on the german wikipedia. I wrote most of the template on the de-wiki and then helped to add it to all the virus-articles on de-wiki (which previously did not have a template but a free-text table). An example can be seen here: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubellavirus it contains the taxonomy as well as genome information (RNA/DNA ss/ds +/-) as well as three outlinks to NCBI and ICTVdb. I work as PhD student in Bioinformatics and I am quite interested in viruses. However my time is limited since I currently also work on other very exciting NGO projects outside the Wikipedia.

What exactly do you mean with "implement the template virusbox"? you mean add it to the wikipedia pages? one way this could work would be if we copy all the german templates that already have the information about taxonomy and genome and NCBI links and use them in the english wikipedia and then fill out the ones that do not have a german article / template on the german wikipedia. However I am not familiar with the English wikipedia's way of doing taxoboxes and this might not be the easiest approach. I am just saying that in general the information is present in machine-readable format on the German wikipedia. Please contact me on my talk page if you are interested. Greetings --hroest 08:11, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

I am interested in staying on in the project! In the past, I did a lot of work on the lambda phage page, but it is definitely not up to many WP standards still... I'm still not really an involved enough wikipedian to know how to write a good article, but I would like that to change. Gorton k (talk) 17:03, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Project advert

Would anyone be able to design a project advert to get more people involved? Here is an example:

Wikipedia ads	file info – #227

Gorton k (talk) 18:11, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

I could put one together for you; let me know what you want it to look like. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 20:48, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

WOW that is messing with my head, red and blue don't go together well for me. Enlil Ninlil (talk) 05:29, 21 April 2012 (UTC)

Haha, like I said, let me know what it should look like, and I'd be happy to do this. Bob the WikipediaN ^{(talk • contribs)} 02:24, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:HighBeam

Wikipedia:HighBeam describes a limited opportunity for Wikipedia editors to have access to HighBeam Research.
—Wavelength (talk) 16:17, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Suggested sections for pathogen related articles

I have started a discussion here Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Medicine-related_articles#Suggested_sections Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 10:26, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

Family with only one Genus

In trying to reduce the number of articles that link to themselves via a redirect I've found the Chrysovirus article. It is about "a group of viruses in the Chrysoviridae family.", with the family name being a redirect back to the article. Googling suggests that the family has only this genus, and so there wouldn't seem (to me as someone who knows little about biology and is completely ignorant of project practice in this regard) no scope for it to become an article. Should the family name just be unlinked or should something else happen? Thryduulf (talk) 15:36, 1 September 2012 (UTC)

It's a common situation, I believe it's called a monotypical taxon. Generally I think (from my experience with turtles) the preference is to have the family article, and have the genus link back. Now viruses are maybe a little different because (to my shock) we don't really know much about them - there are estimated to be millions of genera, but it seems we only know anything much anbout a few thousand of them, and have only classified 2,480. So it is likely that monotypical taxa will probably change as we classify the other millions of viruses. Rich Farmbrough, 23:26, 10 September 2012 (UTC).

List of viruses

I have reformatted this to be in 4 (or less for very short sections) columns throughout, of similar length, instead of the previous 2-5 columns of wildly different lengths. Now I want to add some additional viruses, from ICTV, before I do it would be useful to know if there are other lists I should look at. Rich Farmbrough, 23:40, 10 September 2012 (UTC).

Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Viruses/list is the ICTV list. Rich Farmbrough, 00:55, 11 September 2012 (UTC).

Note I have started merging the lists so to see the raw list use the history. Rich Farmbrough, 15:20, 11 September 2012 (UTC).

OK merge complete. Rich Farmbrough, 18:24, 11 September 2012 (UTC).

Fourth domain of life?

Per the 2012 study that said that giant viruses are a fourth domain of life, along side eukaryotes, prokaryotes and archaea, it might be good to integrate that into virus and some other taxonomic articles.

Study: [3][4] 24 August 2012; BMC Evolutionary Biology; 12:156 , doi:10.1186/1471-2148-12-156 , Nasir, A.; Kim, K. M.; Caetano-Anolles, G. (2012). "Giant viruses coexisted with the cellular ancestors and represent a distinct supergroup along with superkingdoms Archaea, Bacteria and Eukarya". BMC Evolutionary Biology. 12 (1): 156. Bibcode:2012BMCEE..12..156N. doi:10.1186/1471-2148-12-156. PMC 3570343. PMID 22920653. , Arshan Nasir, Kyung Mo Kim, Gustavo Caetano-Anolles, "Giant viruses coexisted with the cellular ancestors and represent a distinct supergroup along with superkingdoms Archaea, Bacteria and Eukarya" [5]

-- 76.65.131.248 (talk) 13:53, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

A very interesting article, but their proposal requires ratification by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses for acceptance. And other independent studies are needed to confirm the results presented. I don't think we can include this in our articles yet. Graham Colm (talk) 17:28, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Proposed deletion: List of viruses

I've proposed deletion of List of viruses. Please discuss there. Suggested because I care about viruses - not because I don't. -- Scray (talk) 15:06, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

Animal viruses

I note to my horror that animal virus redirects to animal virology, a poor article focusing on viruses of veterinary importance which is currently blanked for copyvio. Is there really no decent article on the general term animal virus, as opposed to plant virus? Espresso Addict (talk) 10:50, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

I have removed the redirect from Animal virus and added material, which I have been working on, from my userspace. It's far from perfect, but it's better than nothing. We might want to rename the article Animal viruses. Graham Colm (talk) 19:07, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Excellent, thanks. Haven't done more than skim it, but my first thought is that, as I recall, viruses of humans are included in animal viruses. That's certainly always how I've used the term. I'd suggest adding a short section on the major viruses of humans with a section hatlink to a more detailed overview, if we have one -- I can't seem to locate it. Espresso Addict (talk) 22:56, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Hi Graham!, it's been a while! Just a thought, perhaps the article "Animal Viruses", should be named "Non-Human Animal Viruses" to distinguish it from Human types...Although, some animal viruses 'jump' species to become human viruses..Read-write-services (talk) 23:23, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

My problem was I that wanted a link to explain both "plant viruses" and "animal viruses", in the context of a virologist bio, which this solution wouldn't work for. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:49, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I see the problem. While much is covered in Virus, Animal virus does need to emphasise the differences between them and plant viruses and bacteriophages etc. I'll add more to the article later, to see if we can resolve this issue. Graham Colm (talk) 06:44, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

I've just skimmed virus and most of what I'm thinking of is covered there, but not in any single handily linkable section. And casual clickers are going to be put off by the sheer length of the virus article, I fear: the downside of going for featured status. Btw, a bit of a trawl came up with viral disease as the closest we seem to have to "viruses of humans" or "clinical virology". Espresso Addict (talk) 09:26, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Not to worry, I'll add more to Animal virus to include human viruses. I gather the link is for the Tony Minson article? I remember him from my time at Birmingham University in the 1970s. Graham Colm (talk) 18:33, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Indeed! I knew him a little in Cambridge in the 1980s–90s. If you can add/correct anything to his article that would be super, as I have it up for DYK. Espresso Addict (talk) 22:36, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Portal:Viruses

Portal: Viruses has been nominated for deletion -- 70.24.246.233 (talk) 06:43, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

Disturbed to notice this deletion notice. As I wrote in the deletion discussion, portals are not for WikiProjects but for readers. I'd be willing to try to maintain and improve the portal, if the WikiProject were supportive. Espresso Addict (talk) 14:58, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

I will vote for keep. Sidelight12 ^Talk 08:28, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Microbiology

Should this along with WikiProject Prokaryotes and protists become taskforces under Wikipedia:WikiProject Microbiology. Its worth consideration to consolidate semi active pages. Sidelight12 ^Talk 08:28, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Franklin Stahl

Franklin Stahl has been greatly expanded by someone who appears to be Stahl. I have removed some obvious problems and done a bit of wikification, but a more thorough look by someone who knows this area would be useful. Espresso Addict (talk) 03:53, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Italics in templates?

The ICTV's policy on viral orthography is that specified names of orders, families, subfamilies, genera and species be italicized (See: 3. IX). Should this extend to wiki templates? The two virus-related templates I have noticed that include viral taxa are Template:Retroviruses and Template:Baltimore classification and neither employ the italics standard. ComfyKem (talk) 09:46, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree in principle that we ought to adhere to the ICTV italicisation policy; however at the size/weight the text appears in the Retroviruses template, the italicised text is very pixellated and hard to read on my monitor. The old version was much clearer. Espresso Addict (talk) 09:50, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Virus navs template

A discussion about Template:Virus navs is ongoing at WikiProject Medicine: "Edit requests on medical templates". I'm not sure where exactly it is used -- I encountered it at the portal, where I've now deleted it, but it's also linked on influenza pages. EJM86 is suggesting a change to a text format, with expansion of the unintelligible abbreviations; however this loses all the visual formatting. More opinions would be welcome, especially from anyone who knows how the plethora of virus templates are meant to fit together. Espresso Addict (talk) 09:40, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

The virus navs template appears to be appended to the bottom of the main virus topics template, so it appears on almost all project pages. Espresso Addict (talk) 09:58, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

"Our statistics"

I've been using this table as a gateway to find unassessed virus-related articles, but it doesn't update. The total list of unassessed in the table, for example, is 417, but when going to Category:Unassessed_virus_articles the number is a lot lower. There are more inconsistencies too. It seems as if it took records of what the statistics were at one point in time and got stuck there instead of updating it. Is it suppose to update or stay as is? I think it should be fixed to more accurately reflect the project's "statistics". ComfyKem (talk) 16:16, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Hi, the table does not automatically update, it has to be edited by a human. Graham Colm (talk) 18:22, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Group D arbovirus (arthropod-borne virus)

Thoughts on this article? Most of the information in the article is about the Colorado tick fever virus, which is included in the article Colorado tick fever. The collective organization of all arboviruses into groups seems outdated too, as PubMed searches for Group A arboviruses, Group B arboviruses, Group C arboviruses and Group D arboviruses (no results) almost exclusively finds research done in the 1970s. It doesn't look as if this classification system is used anymore, but if it is, why not just include it in the arbovirus article? ComfyKem (talk) 00:51, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

The term arbovirus itself is outdated and it is no longer in formal virology although it was used for many years to describe a large group of diverse viruses. I don't think separate articles on the old groups are needed, but the parent article should remain. I suggest a merge and redirect. Graham Colm (talk) 05:52, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

Image at smallpox

My position regarding the image at smallpox may be controversial. Thus I have begun a RfC asking for wider community input here Talk:Smallpox#Info_boxes_and_Sick_Child_image. Doc James(talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 18:30, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Spelling of Israeli/Israel acute paralysis virus on WP

I'm starting a discussion here since this virus has no formal page outside of redirects. This virus is implicated as being one of the primary causes of the colony collapse disorder of bees. In the article it is spelled simply as "Israel". It is also spelled this way in the List of diseases of the honey bee article (both spellings have their own article which redirect to the honey bee disease list page). However, when I checked the ICTV database for this virus, it only has the "Israeli" spelling (Picornavirales>Dicistroviridae>Aparavirus). The article for Dicistroviridae also has the spelling as "Israeli" in the Taxonomy section. In PubMed searches, "Israeli" renders 24 results while "Israel" renders seven results, so both names are used in research but "Israeli" more so. Basically what I am asking is this: which name should this virus be called on Wikipedia? Would it be appropriate to use the name the ICTV has it labeled as? ComfyKem (talk) 06:10, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

• Agree with "Israeli". If you add "AND review" to those searches you get 2 secondary sources for "Israeli" and 0 for "Israel". Usage of the two variants overlaps in time, so this is not a "recent" change. I think sources (in number and in quality, with ICTV being perhaps the most important) favor "Isreali". -- Scray (talk) 08:47, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

Pandoravirus

I've just finished creating a stub about this new type of virus reported in today's edition of Science. Editors who actually know something about viruses are encouraged to flesh it out, if you care to. I'm going to go now and nominate this for the front page news, but I don't know whether it will go through. Looie496 (talk) 21:37, 18 July 2013 (UTC)

I have updated Missing topics about Viruses - Skysmith (talk) 09:42, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Help with Talk:Epstein-Barr virus naming controversy

I have been trying to normalize the naming of Epstein–Barr virus related pages on Wikipedia: Talk:Epstein–Barr virus. Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thank you! Walternmoss (talk) 23:15, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

ICTV-ID on Wikidata

I am trying to add the ICTV-ID to viruses on Wikidata (e.g. added the ID to d:Q374232). Does anybody know where I can get a complete list with virus name and ID? --Tobias1984 (talk) 21:51, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

Try here. Malke 2010 (talk) 23:54, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. I can use this opportunity and ask if you have any ideas for other virus related data that Wikidata could store. --Tobias1984 (talk) 00:01, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Data on outbreaks is important, the older outbreaks as well as the recent outbreaks of novel emerging viruses, like SARS and MERS-CoVs. Are you linking this data in any way? Malke 2010 (talk) 03:43, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Currently we are building up the database. It will still take one or two years until the data can be used in any serious ways. Demos of how the data could be displayed are here: https://tools.wmflabs.org/reasonator/?lang=en&q=Q705548 - But it works a lot better with people than with scientific topics. I already went through the list of outbreaks and I think in a few months we will be able to generate some nice queries. I will post something here once we get to that point. --Tobias1984 (talk) 16:24, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Please help a draft article at AfC

Please take a look at Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Taxonomic Table of Viral Species and evaluate it's usefulness. Besides the obvious concern about the sheer size of the table the introductory text contains a lot of discussion of the table itself apparently trying to justify it's existence - this simply doesn't look to me like an appropriate intro for the table. The author could really use some help from experienced subject specialist editors. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 21:20, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

@Dodger67: Looks more suitable for Wikidata. We already have a List of viruses and List of virus families. Maybe put him in touch with Tobias1984. He's looking for virus related data for Wikidata to store. Malke 2010 (talk) 13:52, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Please feel free to contact the draft writer, User:DrStephenHuff, directly. My understanding of Wikidata (and viruses) is severely lacking so I would really not be able to participate meaningfully in the discussion. Thanks Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 14:32, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

I contacted User:DrStephenHuff and hopefully he can help out on Wikidata. I think the table is better stored in a database, because querying gets really important with tables that size. --Tobias1984 (talk) 21:33, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, @Tobias1984:. Malke 2010 (talk) 02:40, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Variola virus

Variola virus currently redirects. But in other languages there is a separate page for the virus d:Q11877169. Just posting this here in case somebody wants to improve inter-Wikipedia-linking. --Tobias1984 (talk) 09:18, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

It should have its own article and not redirect. I've had it on my list of things to do but I've recently had eye surgery and can't spend too much time on Wikipedia just yet. Malke 2010 (talk) 19:13, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Great. And take your time getting well :) --Tobias1984 (talk) 19:18, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Enterovirus 68

There are emerging reports suggesting that Enterovirus 68 may be responsible for a recent outbreak of polio-like paralytic infectious disease in California. See [6], [7]. There's nothing in the Enterovirus article about this now. I imagine there should be, but since WP:MEDRS probably applies here, haven't been able to find any suitable refs. Is there a special exception for breaking-news medical stories like this? -- Emerine (talk) 16:47, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

• I have made a stub. There are hundreds of results in Google Scholar for Enterovirus 68. Abductive (reasoning) 16:17, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

Italics for family names?

I have noticed that many virus articles italicize taxonomic names higher than genus. This is an error, right? Abductive (reasoning) 02:29, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

No, it is not an error. Read section 3 IX - "Rules for Orthography" ComfyKem (talk) 14:02, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

Oh, thanks. Abductive (reasoning) 05:33, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Inconsistency

I am admittedly unfamiliar to this WikiProject, and more familiar with articles for cellular organisms. Having said that, it appears to me that there is a lack of consistency for virus articles, or at least in several articles I visited that are associated with the Nucleocytoplasmic large DNA viruses article (yes, I found my way here from the main page). Without the intention to seem arrogant, I listed of some of things I've noticed so far:

General

• Despite being standard to italicise families, titles of family articles are not italicised

Nucleocytoplasmic large DNA viruses

• Lists Pithovirus as a family rather than Pithoviridae
• Links to Pandoravirus rather than Pandoraviridae
• Does not list Pithoviridae in taxobox

Asfarviridae

• Asfivirus in taxobox is not bold, despite Asfarviridae being monotypic

Ascovirus

• Article is titled by genus rather than family
• Ascovirus in taxobox is not bold, despite Ascoviridae being monotypic

Iridoviridae

• Iridoviridae in taxobox is not bold

Marseilleviridae

• Monotypic genus, Marseillevirus, is a separate article rather than keeping info. at family and making name bold in taxobox
• Marseilleviridae in taxobox is not italicised or bold

Megaviridae

• Megaviridae in taxobox is not bold

Mimiviridae

• Mimiviridae in taxobox has not been italicised and is not bold

Pandoraviridae

• Monotypic genus, Pandoravirus, has separate article rather than keeping info. at family and making name bold in taxobox

Pithovirus

• Article is titled by genus rather than family!
• Both Pithoviridae and Pithovirus are not bold

I would appreciate it if anyone could confirm that these are actually mistakes before I go ahead and ruin it all. One particularly big change would be moving Pithovirus to Pithoviridae, given that it is currently linked on the main page. I fear these (believed) problems are not confined to just Nucleocytoplasmic large DNA viruses articles. If so, I guess it would be a reflection of virus classification only getting to it's feet. JamesDouch (talk) 12:23, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

There is a lot of inconsistency. But any editor can create separate articles about a species, genus, family, etc. So long as they have reliable sources, there shouldn't be a problem. Especially among the emerging viruses, it's best to allow for separate articles. Regarding Pithovirus, I would not move it to the family name. It would be better to create an article about the family. As you may be aware, virus families can be extremely divergent. An article about the characteristics of the family would be welcome. But attempting to put everything into one article can be problematic and leave the article susceptible to vandalism.

As for the inconsistency in italics/bold in names, that's just down to editors being focused on the topic, getting the reliable sources, and putting it all together, especially when creating the article. It's easy to miss those details. Also, some editors might not be aware of the convention as not every editor has a background in the topic. Malke 2010 (talk) 17:29, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

But wouldn't it be conventional to merge two articles that describe the same thing? For example, Marseilleviridae apparently only contains one genus, Marseillevirus, and therefore all content is actually referring to the same thing. In other WikiProjects at least, it's conventional to merge such articles to the highest ranking taxon. Assuming this is not your convention, then how far in the other direction is it normally taken? Should one article be created for the monotypic Pithovirus, and then another for Pithovirus sibericum? JamesDouch (talk) 22:39, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

The knowledge base in virology is rapidly changing as new technologies emerge. The articles you mention above will easily be expanded over time, and likely sooner than later. Keeping things separate keeps things coherent and provides an excellent framework to build up Wikipedia's virus content. Malke 2010 (talk) 00:16, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

Phlebovirus, Phlebovirus...

What are we going to do with this genus? Starting with the genus article, the taxobox has dozens of viruses listed. The "serogroups" section has all of these - and many more which may or may not exist - split into serocomplexes, presumably identifying each of the named viruses as a serotype of different species. When looking at the ICTV's taxonomy, Phlebovirus officially has nine species, not ten or 40+ (Bhanja virus may be a novel 10th member[8]). On WP though, some of the serotypes have their own articles, while most species don't. Toscana virus is a subspecies of the Sandfly fever Naples virus species, but Sandfly fever Naples virus has no article. This is one of the messier virus genera on WP, so it would be nice to have some clean up, but how should we deal with it?

I've thought of the creation of the nine species articles, with all of the serotypes/subtypes redirecting to the species article. So "Toscana virus", as well as "Karimabad virus" and "Tehran virus",[9] would redirect to "Sandfly fever Naples virus". This would greatly reduce the number of red links and make the Phlebovirus genus article and its species derivatives neater. Thoughts? ComfyKem (talk) 05:43, 14 February 2014 (UTC)

I'd be interested in building up Phlebovirus by writing articles from the red links. I'd hold off redirects until things are better sorted. By that I mean, as the taxonomy of these species are still not clear yet, the serotypes can be unclassified for now. Malke 2010 (talk) 00:47, 15 February 2014 (UTC)

I think some degree of a standard does exist in this classification, just that the words serocomplex and species are being used as synonyms here. My primary reservations with creating an article for every single red link in this genus is that for most of them, there simply aren't enough sources to get the articles above a stub, and some of these serotypes are confirmed by the ICTV as belonging to a species. "Arbia virus" was merged into "Salehabad virus" in 1999.[10] And Adria virus, which I have created, and "Arumowot virus" and "Odrenisrou virus" have recently been proposed to also belong to Salehabad.[11] So wouldn't it be more organized to have a species article with general information on virology, and sections dedicated to each serotype (with redirects to the sections), unless that serotype is exceptionally notable? In that case, like for Toscana virus, it could have its own article. We would have 10-15 starts instead of 40-50 stubs for this genus. ComfyKem (talk) 05:15, 15 February 2014 (UTC)

ComfyKem Yes, it would be. Make the articles based on the serocomplexes and back it up with RS that shows there have been proposals in the literature to incorporate the unclassified species into the particular complex. Like the Arbia, Adria, Arumowot and Odrenisrou, for instance, are unclassified and its been proposed that they be moved into the Salehabad species complex. You have that RS already. You could start that article. Malke 2010 (talk) 19:26, 15 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi, I'm not a taxonomist by any means, but with my research I have been looking a fair bit at viral taxonomy, and the Wikipedia pages on Viruses seem a bit of a mess in general (Phleboviruses being a good example of this, for the reasons outlined above). Is there a reason why the ICTV isn't used more widespread? It seems bizarre to have a consistent internationally recognised classification for these things, and then to ignore them (to a certain extent?) Daemon24 (talk) 19:50, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

We try to stick to the ICTV's guidelines, but some things happen. Many newer editors who are not familiar with the ICTV's role - or even its existence - in viral taxonomy may not be aware of the "rules" and end up botching taxoboxes et al. There is also the problem that many virus articles get left alone for long periods of time, so recent changes in taxonomy may not reach all virus articles (an argument to substantially reduce the number of virus stubs). There are other things that Malke mentions below, but practically all of the most important virus articles follow the standard, so it's mainly smaller, less viewed, and less important articles which mess the rules up. In these cases, you're welcome to clean up articles if necessary. ComfyKem (talk) 04:58, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. Just wanted to make sure that if I did make any changes based on the ICTV breakdown, I wasn't wasting my time working against someone else's ideas! In fact the taxonomy of the Phleboviruses seems to be based upon the 7th/8th reports of the ICTV (where all the 50+ genus listed were actually correct). I'll start making some changes, using Phlebovirus as a starting point; if someonecould keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn't go horribly wrong, that would be greatly appreciated! Daemon24 (talk) 11:55, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

Viruses talk:Flavivirus

There appear to be conflicting statements below: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flavivirus

"Most of these viruses are transmitted by the bite from an infected arthropod (mosquito or tick) and hence, classified as arboviruses. " seems to conflict with the later statement: "The known non-arboviruses of the flavivirus family either reproduce in arthropods or vertebrates, but not both."

If it's a non-arbovirus how would it reproduce in an arthropod?

1medhead (talk) 22:16, 5 April 2014 (UTC)1medhead

Although it is not a formal term in virus classification, an arbovirus is one that is transmitted to humans via arthropods not just a virus that reproduces in arthropods. There is no contradiction. Graham Colm (talk) 10:54, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

Super-spreader

Recent events at the page Super-spreader has received some additional attention from off-wikipedia discussion of the page in this blog post, which was linked by the popular site hacker news. As I mentioned on the talk page, it is likely useful to have some subject matter editors on hand there to serve as neutral parties, as it is likely that many people were drawn to the page as a result of specific criticisms leveled at an editor there. 128.32.151.118 (talk) 16:29, 6 May 2014 (UTC)

Canine parvovirus

Canine parvovirus is up for GAR at Talk:Canine parvovirus/GA2. James^x12345 16:52, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Pageview stats

After a recent request, I added WikiProject Viruses to the list of projects to compile monthly pageview stats for. The data is the same used by http://stats.grok.se/en/ but the program is different, and includes the aggregate views from all redirects to each page. The stats are at Wikipedia:WikiProject Viruses/Popular pages.

The page will be updated monthly with new data. The edits aren't marked as bot edits, so they will show up in watchlists. You can view more results, request a new project be added to the list, or request a configuration change for this project using the Tool Labs tool. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let me know. Thanks! Mr.Z-man 17:59, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

Ebola virus outbreak RfC

Please take the time to comment on the 2014 West African Ebola virus outbreak RfC here. SW3 5DL (talk) 12:32, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal

Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:48, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Visualization window does not work correctly

I do not know how to fix it or I would. The visualization window needs to advance when clicked, not automatically. It needs to stop scrolling. Second. When clicking on it it does not enlarge to the class (I - VII) you click. It changes class. Third, the back arrow should go to a different class, not a different set of images.

The scrolling visualization is a superb idea but it needs to be refined. I have no clue as to how to fix it. Suggest a starting point and I will give it a try. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nantucketbob (talk • contribs) 21:32, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

Please comment on this RfC regarding the Ebola epidemic

Hello WikiProject Viruses members!

There is an RfC regarding the Ebola epidemic that would benefit from your input.

The RfC link is here.

The question is:

Should we keep these newly created separate country articles about the Ebola epidemic, or should we delete/redirect, them to Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa?

• 2014 Ebola virus epidemic in Guinea
• 2014 Ebola virus epidemic in Liberia
• 2014 Ebola virus epidemic in Sierra Leone
• 2014 Ebola virus case in the United States

Your participation is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

SW3 5DL (talk) 23:03, 4 October 2014 (UTC)

WikiProject X is live!

Hello everyone!

You may have received a message from me earlier asking you to comment on my WikiProject X proposal. The good news is that WikiProject X is now live! In our first phase, we are focusing on research. At this time, we are looking for people to share their experiences with WikiProjects: good, bad, or neutral. We are also looking for WikiProjects that may be interested in trying out new tools and layouts that will make participating easier and projects easier to maintain. If you or your WikiProject are interested, check us out! Note that this is an opt-in program; no WikiProject will be required to change anything against its wishes. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

Note: To receive additional notifications about WikiProject X on this talk page, please add this page to Wikipedia:WikiProject X/Newsletter. Otherwise, this will be the last notification sent about WikiProject X.

Harej (talk) 16:58, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

Discussion on potential article: Supergroup_(biology)

There is a discussion about whether an article called Supergroup_(biology) should be created, but the term appears to have different usages in eukaryotes, bacteria, and viruses. Please weigh in at: Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Tree_of_Life#We_apparently_need_to_create_an_article_for_Supergroup_(biology). Cheers! --Animalparty-- (talk) 21:37, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Taxonomic List of Viruses

Greetings! I am a new user looking for a place to publish my list of viruses. It is currently living in my sandbox, so feel free to take a look and suggest edits. What I really would like is advice and suggestions on where it should end up (I believe it is of value and more up-to-date than other similar lists). Any help/comments would be appreciated. Thanks! Bervin61 (talk) 19:31, 9 February 2015 (UTC)

This is structured very well with the way you have so many taxa and can clearly see the red links and the show/no show. I am not sure if it can be used as an article or added to one, but could we post it here at the virus project for an index of missing major taxa? MicroPaLeo (talk) 03:27, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

List of viruses from above

Can this very welll organized list of viruses be put in an article? Draft:List of viruses

It seems more useful than the existing one in many ways. List of viruses

Comments, suggestions? MicroPaLeo (talk) 03:32, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

Yes, it should definitely replace the existing article. Not a new article, but just delete the existing text and insert the new text. Something that should be changed though is that some subfamily unassigneds, like the one in dsRNA > Unassigned > Amalgaviridae should be deleted. The ICTV doesn't apply the subfamily level to all viruses like it does with orders, so there is no reason to include unassigned subfamily in families that don't have subfamilies. It's just a layer of unneeded drop downs. ComfyKem (talk) 09:31, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree, as the reviewer of the current version at Draft:List of viruses. After fixing up the draft, just erase the content in List of viruses and copy the new version in. Then you will have the article history intact. After that happens I can ask for the draft article to be deleted. StarryGrandma (talk) 17:58, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

Oops, I goofed Bervin61, MicroPaLeo, and ComfyKem. Don't just copy it over. We need to preserve the edit history of both pages. I'm putting a question in at Articles for Creation to find out the procedure. StarryGrandma (talk) 18:28, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

Not involved with AFC, but as far as I understand it you need to move List of viruses to List of viruses (alphabetical) without creating a redirect, and then immediately move Draft:List of viruses to mainspace to replace it. (If you create a redirect then an admin will be needed to delete the redirect.)

As List of viruses survived an AfD in 2012, if we then wanted to delete List of viruses (alphabetical) it would need to be taken to AfD again, but personally I'd just leave it, as it allows people to find viruses easily without needing to open up all the subsections. Espresso Addict (talk) 19:13, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

I think both are useful, so we should discuss how to proceed, but the technical sort has a power the random alphabetical list does not. StarryGrandma, no fault to you on this. MicroPaLeo (talk) 19:23, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

ComfyKem I will make the recommended change tomorrow. I've just written a python script to do my formatting for me, so it shouldn't be too hard. In order to facilitate easier editing in the future, would it be wise to upload the script for future changes to the ICTV? Thanks to everyone for their interest and work! Bervin61 (talk) 03:28, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

RfC

Please see the RfC on Lloviu virus talk page. Thanks. SW3 5DL (talk) 06:38, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

proposed addition to project guidelines

As there are a large number of viruses, having an article for each virus and taxon would make virus articles difficult to maintain, leaving many articles in poor condition. In order to help keep a manageable number of virus articles, the following guidelines should be adhered to:

*1. Serotypes, genotypes, strains, and isolates of virus species should not receive their own articles unless they are exceptionally notable, as is the case for certain subtypes of influenza. Otherwise, such information should be merged into a species, genus, or family article.

• 2. A virus species should only be considered notable enough to receive its own article if it is exceptionally notable. If a species stub cannot develop to start-class, even if it is exceptionally notable, then it should be merged into a genus or family article.
• 3. For purposes of 1 and 2, "exceptionally notable" means that
  • (a) at least one review of research specifically about the virus has been published in a peer-reviewed journal, and
  • alt. (a) the virus is mentioned in at least 10 separate research articles, and
  • alt. (a) there is enough information for the species article to develop to at least start-class, and
  • (b) the virus is either pathogenic or beneficial to an organism it infects or is commonly used for research or medicinal purposes.
• 4. 1 through 3 may be waived in instances in which a novel virus is causing a widely-reported outbreak, but should apply after such outbreak has ended.
• 5. If any viral taxon has only one taxon below it, such as a family having only one genus or a genus having only one species, then the lower taxon should be merged into the higher taxon in order to avoid duplication.
• 6. Viral taxa above the species level are to be considered notable enough to receive their own articles if they are recognized by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses in its most recent taxonomy release. Proposed taxa that are not recognized by the ICTV in its most recent taxonomy release should not be considered notable enough to receive their own articles.
• alt. 6. Viral taxa above the species level are to be considered notable enough to receive their own articles if they are recognized by the ICTV in its most recent taxonomy release. Proposed taxa that are widely used (mentioned at least ten times) in research are notable enough to receive their own articles, but the articles should clearly state that they are proposed and not officially recognized.

Disagree with everything. This is not based on science. It seems based more on one editor's misunderstanding of virology. SW3 5DL (talk) 05:56, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Others disagreed also, the result is below. MicroPaLeo (talk) 06:10, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Right now there are about 2,000 articles under this project, with hundreds that are definition stubs and not much else (X is a plant virus + taxobox). My proposal would significantly reduce the number of virus articles and improve the quality of many of those that would remain. That's just a draft, but do other members of this project support something like this? ComfyKem (talk) 13:11, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree with this proposal in principle, but the wording needs more thought. We need a definition of "notable" that is not circular, and I don't think one review article will suffice in many cases. I also anticipate a problem with the plant viruses with regard to point number 5. We have to remember that most readers will be looking up common names. Redirects can be used of course, but my observations of student users is that these should be minimal as they have a tendency to drive readers away. Graham Beards (talk) 14:06, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I've revised it a bit. Feel free to revise my draft or come up with your own. Can't the issue of common names be solved just by including them alongside the species in an article? So something like "Tulip virusvirus is commonly known as the Greek Tulip virus and the Parthenon virus". Or:

• Tulip virusvirus
  • Synonyms: Greek Tulip virus, Parthenon virus

Mergers don't have to exclude common names. ComfyKem (talk) 16:17, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

• I strongly disagree with most items of this proposal. There is a long-standing tradition that all species are worthy of articles and I see no reason to dismiss this here. There seems no reason to restrict numbers of articles just because people in this project can't keep up with them -- it seems a reason for trying to recruit more people to the project! There might be something to be said for merging items where, say, four viruses ANYV-1–4 have identical microstub articles, but in an informal way that allows someone to decide to write an article on ANYV-3 if data emerge that would support a longer article. (By the way, as projects go, 2000 is on the small end. I think it's the smallest of all the projects I've been involved with.)

On (6), if a taxon is being widely used or discussed in the literature then it makes sense to have an article, though it should make clear that it is not (yet) officially recognised by the ICTV.

The points I would agree with are (1) on subtypes, which I'd agree should only exceptionally be considered notable enough for standalone articles; and (5) on lower taxons where there is only a single one (though "duplication", not "duplicity"!).

I don't know how widely this has been advertised; it seems to me that proposing to break the "each species deserves an article" tradition would require much wider input than just this project. Espresso Addict (talk) 16:56, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

• At least one, even two or more, "review articles?" We would have articles on model viruses and nothing else. If there are 17 aricles with the virus as its primary topic and no review article, it would be considered non-notable. The standard is unreal. Writers would keep seeing a missing article with a lt of literature, then, hat, keep creating it and the project deletes it for not having two review articles written about it? Part of this, I think, is that it comes from a bias of looking at human disease viruses, whereas my experience is pure research, but I think the standard is out of alignment with Wikipedia. Upmerging single taxa to their single taxon parent is good. MicroPaLeo (talk) 22:50, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm not involved with Virus articles, but I support any guidelines that promote better encyclopedia articles, not simply more. An often overlooked "rule of thumb", posted on this and several other taxon projects in some form or another, readsAs a general guideline though, combine several species or subspecies into a single article when there isn't enough text to make more than short, unsatisfying stubs otherwise. If the article grows large enough to deserve splitting, that can always be done later. I'm all for that. --Animalparty-- (talk) 04:02, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree with this because the one sentence stubs are not maintained or watched by anyone. There are 4000 poorly categorized Insects of Europe (parent category, when more useful child exists, but other problems, too). Many of these could be gatherede into a list of species, and leave a cople hundred articles instead of thousands to fix. MicroPaLeo (talk) 04:11, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

• Is there an example of a virus that meets 3a but not 3b? Or which meets 3b but isn't worthy of an article? It seems like an overly strict set of requirements. As it's easier to build on a stub than to start a new article, stubs can be generally useful to encourage further editing. —Pengo 05:56, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
  • Viruses are a little different from ToL organisms, as it is not unusual to have one familiar taxon in a genus or family. In this case having stub articles on obscure genera is almost worthless, imo. But, I will try to find an example. Yes, it seems 3a, given 3b. MicroPaLeo (talk) 06:07, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
  • There are many 3bs that have at most five reliable sources and cannot develop to more than a stub. 3a is a sort of "cap" on 3b. ComfyKem (talk) 07:54, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
    • Can you give an example? I don't work in human health, and it may be more obvious to you, but in plants, the level of research necessary to establish pathogenicity is such that you tend to wind up with enough reliable sources that you could write an article. I could write almost any Wikipedia article with five reliable source, btw. Most articles I look at have one reliable source or appear scrubbed from a database. MicroPaLeo (talk) 07:59, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
      • To be clearer, I should have said that there may be some viruses that cause a disease but that also do not have a review about them because scientists likely don't consider them as important as other viruses. So among the grapevine viruses, there are 68 PubMed sources,[12] but 50 of these mention Grapevine virus A[13], 28 mention B,[14] and the only review is about the vitiviruses as a whole, so it is likely that the genus, A, and B are the only ones with enough sources to get out of stubitude. I think that 3 could be relaxed since grapevine A and B viruses have enough sources to be well developed (but no specific review), the other grapevine viruses not so much. ComfyKem (talk) 09:16, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
        • Okay, I thought you were saying the opposite. I agree. MicroPaLeo (talk) 15:46, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

So far, there appears to be support for 1 and 5. User:Espresso Addict has a reasonable objection to 6 (the objection currently applies to Megavirales[15]), which I would like others in this project to comment on. The primary disagreement is when a species is considered notable enough for its own article, since given the sheer number of species in existence, maintaining an article for all species (and WP:VIRUS is nowhere near close to that) becomes increasingly difficult. Some users support having an article for each species while others support merging certain ones into the genus. I think that User:Animalparty's comment is reasonable not just for viruses but for all forms of life. ComfyKem (talk) 07:54, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

• My position on species doesn't quite fit into ComfyKem's summary. I'm opposed to generating notability criteria for virus (or any other) species. However, I have no objection to merging micro-stubs on species until at least a viable stub can be written and I like the wording Animalparty quotes.

Re (6), I'd suggest not quantifying "widely" but leaving it up to common sense; 10 papers from a single group not associated with the relevant nomenclature study group would be less convincing than a smaller number of papers from unconnected groups, particularly if they were part of the relevant nomenclature study group. Espresso Addict (talk) 16:53, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

I agree with not quantifying. MicroPaLeo (talk) 18:46, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

• 1. Serotypes, genotypes, strains, isolates, and other subtypes of virus species should not receive their own articles unless they are exceptionally notable, as is the case for certain subtypes of influenza viruses.

What exactly qualifies as "exceptionally notable?" SW3 5DL (talk) 07:02, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

• 2. Articles for virus species that only have a definition and a taxonomy box should either be improved or merged into the relevant genus article.
• 3. If any taxon has only one taxon below it, such as a genus having only one species, then the lower taxon should be merged into the higher taxon in order to avoid duplication.
• 4. Unless 3 applies, any taxon that is either recognized by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses in its most recent taxonomy release or is widely used in scientific literature is notable enough to receive its own article.

Is this an agreeable addition to the guidelines? Not as strict or narrow as the original, but still helps to keep things in this project clean. I've removed quantifiers since those are likely to create issues. ComfyKem (talk) 18:17, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

• I'm reasonably comfortable with that. We'd need to watch out as a project that it didn't mean that microstubs on species get deleted, rather than merged, if they have any usable unique content at all -- I know deleting admins can get a bit over-enthusiastic at times. Espresso Addict (talk) 19:36, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
• I think this is easy to understand and sensible. We should make sure all virus articles have a project tag, so, umm, is there a viruses for deletion category? MicroPaLeo (talk) 21:25, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

It's possible to get a project-specific article alert, which would include deletion among other things -- does anyone know how to go about getting this set up? I know when I was trawling for material for the portal, I found numerous articles that were not project tagged. One can also request a new articles alert which is helpful with catching & tagging articles not written by project members (and recruiting new members, potentially). Espresso Addict (talk) 22:18, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Yes, there is a bot that does this called AlexNewArticleBot or something, and individual editors can get or watch it for specific projects. I think I have seen it at plants, but, if there is a central bot listing, you could find it and how it works. MicroPaLeo (talk) 23:54, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

See this plant page for article alert information. Also, for finding insects by family I just used a boolean Google search, which would work for finding virus articles. MicroPaLeo (talk) 23:59, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Absolutely not. None of these guidelines will improve the virus articles on WP. The research article requirement of 10 alone will wipe out all the emerging bat viruses. And what is so magical about the number 10? That alone shows the lack of any solid rationale for this. SW3 5DL (talk) 06:28, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

That requirement has been removed, and for the reasons you state. As I noted above, it appears the proposal was originally written by editor(s) who work with human pathogenic viruses, where these standards are easily met. MicroPaLeo (talk) 06:31, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

These standards are not easily met with emerging viruses. And who are these editors? And WP allows primary sources. This is most needed in the viruses. We're not writing medical disease articles. We're writing about the viruses. We can't sit around waiting for review articles to show up. That's a nonsense standard in the case of viruses, especially the emerging bat viruses. SW3 5DL (talk) 06:38, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

I am having a hard time explaining this. People already disagreed with the number of articles and review article requirements, so these are no longer being suggested. The small box below is the current suggestion, not the big one above. Review articles is not part of it. 10 articles is not part of it. MicroPaLeo (talk) 06:48, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

My point is that none of these proposals are useful. If something needs to be accomplished it, it needs to be defined first with an ICTV rationale. He appears to be simply doing this to eliminate articles, but to what end? To create space on servers? It doesn't matter even when something is deleted, it still exists on the WP servers. So he decides that a strain isn't important? Sorry, no. The coronavirus strains in MERS are relevant, and I shouldn't have to explain why. It should be obvious, yet he blanked the pages and redirected them. These proposals have no basis in science or even in WP policy. SW3 5DL (talk) 07:02, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't know what you are talking about, but it doesn't seem to be the proposals, so I will leave it be. MicroPaLeo (talk) 07:35, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Project reports and finding untagged articles.

@Espresso Addict: I noticed the discussion above about article alerts. WikiProject Viruses was already signed up for a number of reporting tools, although these reports weren't linked from any of the project pages. I've added links to the main project page for the Article Alert tool, Quality Log, New Pages report and the most Popular Pages. Feel free to move them to a subpage if you think it clutters the main page. If anybody is interesting in monitoring these reports, I find it helpful to watchlist the pages that are edited by the bot that generates the report (what's linked on the project page is transcluded, so while it will update regularly, you won't be notified of changes by watchlisting the main project page). The pages to watchlist are: Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Virus articles by quality log, Wikipedia:WikiProject Viruses/Article alerts, User:AlexNewArtBot/VirusesSearchResult, and Wikipedia:WikiProject Viruses/Popular pages.

There is an additional reporting tool that WikiProject Viruses is still not signed up for. It's the Cleanup listing, which monitors articles with various clean-up templates (e.g. citation needed, clarification needed, general cleanup, etc.). For an example of the report generated by this tool, see here. I can see about signing this project up for the cleanup listing if people are interested.

Except for the new article report, all of these tools are based on having {{WikiProject Viruses}} present on the articles Talk page. There are a number of articles on virus species that don't yet have the project tag. Catscan is a tool which will find many of the untagged articles. In particular, this search should show most of the untagged articles in the scope of WikiProject Viruses, although there are some false positives. I've excluded a few subcategories related to prominent human disease causing viruses because they included large numbers of false positives; there are surely some relevant articles under Category:Smallpox, but it also includes hundreds of articles on people who've been infected with the disease. A more carefully constructed search of the subcategories I excluded could winnow out most of the false positives. Plantdrew (talk) 21:51, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for these, Plantdrew. I believe I requested the popular pages listing when I was expanding the project's portal, and then never got around to linking it here. Some form of automatic project tagging would be very helpful -- I tag all the pages I come across in my portal-related searches but it's tedious work. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:25, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Well, I'll probably work some on tagging species (and other taxa) as time permits; I like multitasking the tedious stuff while I watch TV. There really aren't that many untagged virus taxa. Aside from taxa, I'm not sure what else should get the project tag. Antiviral drugs? Viral proteins? Articles on outbreaks of a particular virus? Animal reservoirs of a particular virus (e.g. Gambian pouched rat)? There are ways to automate project tagging but they are basically category based and depend on the categories being only including relevant articles. Charity Treks was recently tagged for the virus project by somebody doing semi-automated tagging, but it doesn't seem very relevant to me. Plantdrew (talk) 02:17, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

From the point of view of the portal I'd be keen to include virologists (as one of the major suggested sections for portals is biographies) but I can understand why others here might object. Espresso Addict (talk) 03:14, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

From my point of view, I'd favor including the articles on virologists and virus outbreaks. Viral proteins are borderline, but I'd include them before antiviral drugs. Animal reservoirs and specific HIV charities shouldn't be included (although some broader articles on cultural impacts of certain viruses may be relevant). Plantdrew (talk) 04:55, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Table of Viral Information

I have a new article I'd like to publish, but it's essentially a giant table. I would like some advice/help formatting it and getting it into a usable format. I am thinking I should add the relevant parts to existing pages (such as all the genera in a family to a new section in that family's page). I may not be making much sense; please take a look and tell me what you think. It's currently on my Sandbox.
Espresso Addict, MicroPaLeo, and ComfyKem, you were all very helpful in helping me publish my Taxonomic list of viruses, and I'm hoping you can point me in the right direction again.
Thanks! Bervin61 (talk) 18:41, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

I haven't heard from anyone yet, but I've created my table here. Please give feedback; I'm not entirely happy with how it turned out, and would like to get some suggestions on formatting. Thanks! Bervin61 (talk) 14:30, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

I think it's too big for it's own article, but the information can easily be split off into the relevant articles, like what you did with Yualikevirus. ComfyKem (talk) 09:25, 14 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm planning to do the same with each page I create, hoping it becomes standard practice. I'm still pretty new, but is there any way to make the tables into a template for genera (and/or other taxa)? Also, I'm interested in building a database of such information - keeping the tables linked in some way and centralized somewhere would be ideal for my uses. Any advice? Bervin61 (talk) 19:51, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what you're looking for, but some of Wikipedia's sister projects might serve your goals better. Wikispecies is heavily dependent on templates (but allows little content beside basic taxonomic information). Wikidata is a database (there's really no good way to do a structured data scheme on Wikipedia or Wikispecies). You might find {{Automatic taxobox}} useful here on Wikipedia. There have been bots in the past that have created taxon articles on Wikipedia from external databases, but the bot generated articles had various problems, and I don't think people on English Wikipedia want to see bots making more taxon pages at present (the Swedish Wikipedia on the other hand has upwards of 1 million bot-generated articles on biological taxa). You could use regular expressions to convert a table or other structured data into a simple prose article, but that might be more trouble than it's worth. Plantdrew (talk) 21:47, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

Portal:Viruses

Over the past couple of months, I have worked to expand the Viruses portal, and I think it is now reasonably well developed. I have set up a suggestions page for new content, if anyone is interested in suggesting articles or commenting on my latest suggestions. It is still not getting all that many hits; would anyone object if I were to add a graphical link to the portal in the See also section of some of the project's popular articles? I note it has already been added to some articles (not by me) at the very bottom, underneath the virus templates, but that isn't the place where such links are recommended to be placed. Espresso Addict (talk) 04:48, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Excellent work. Well done you. SW3 5DL (talk) 18:24, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Request for Opinion on Redirect

In Wikipedia:Teahouse/Questions#Article_that_should_be_a_redirect I asked the following: "I noticed that the Groundnut crinkle virus article looks like is should be a redirect to the Cowpea mild mottle virus. Both articles list the other's species name as a synonym, and none of the other synonyms listed (identical for each virus) have an article. Is there someone with some level of expertise in virus taxonomy who could take a look and change Groundnut crinkle virus into a redirect if appropriate?" It was recommended in the response that I inquire here. Thanks. Carl Henderson (talk) 23:02, 18 April 2015 (UTC)

While GCV is not listed by the ICTV, I do not find anything (other than the Cowpea mild mottle virus article) claiming that they are synonymous. The best I've found (from a short search) is that they are "serologically related." I would suggest that the claim of synonymity needs a citation before the articles be merged. I am, however, by no means an expert in the field. Bervin61 (talk) 17:34, 20 April 2015 (UTC)

For what it's worth, this citation says they are "closely related by can be differentiated by their host ranges"

The Plant Viruses: The Filamentous Plant Viruses

by R.G. Milne, Springer Science & Business Media, November 9, 2013
Carl Henderson (talk) 03:32, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Massive contribution

I am currently adding/updating hundreds of articles on genera, familia, and sub-familia. I've written scripts to pull from ICTV and ViralZone and write coherent articles (I hope). It would be GREATLY appreciated if I could get some help proofing these. Please check through my recent contributions for the newly created/edited articles. Thank you! Bervin61 (talk) 17:11, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Renaming/moving virus families

Several virus families are in articles using their less formal name, ending in -virus. Due to the recently formalized naming standard by ICTV where all genera end in -virus, all subfamilies end in -virinae, and all families end in -viridae, this informal naming has become confusing. For example, family Picornaviridae is under the article Picornavirus. Similarly, Retroviridae is at Retrovirus. These pages seem to refer to genera rather than familia.

This would be easy to remedy, and (assuming ICTV sticks with their current naming guidelines) will reduce confusion going forward, especially in cases such as genus Barnavirus and family Barnaviridae, or Chrysovirus and Chrysoviridae, Endornavirus and Endornaviridae, etc. Bervin61 (talk) 21:30, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm generally in agreement with this, but please be aware of WP:COMMONNAME and that Wikipedia is not a mirror site of the ICTV. If a reader looks up norovirus, they probably just want to learn about norovirus and not about viral taxonomy. Unless an article exists for the viral family, I suggest leaving the redirect in place. Also WP:NOT might be pertinent here. Graham Beards (talk) 21:48, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

Marseillesviridae

Could do with a cleanup - it's currently contradictory. (I don't have the time to check the literature myself.) Lavateraguy (talk) 16:35, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

I've updated Marseillesviridae and its genus Marseillesvirus according to ViralZone and the current ICTV. There's probably more in literature, but at least it is up to date. Bervin61 (talk) 21:04, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa

hi, Espresso Addict was wondering if you would consider moving the importance of the above article from "mid" to "high"[16] (it as you know has ended[17]) thank you--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 14:10, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

The guidelines for the project seem to put it at Mid (or even Low) but I haven't checked how well they are generally adhered to. Feel free to change it, if you consider it appropriate. Espresso Addict (talk) 21:10, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

that being the case I shall leave it as is, thanks--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 22:15, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

Outbreak-related requested move discussions

There are a few outbreak-related WP:RM discussions going on.

• Talk:1854 Broad Street cholera outbreak#Requested move 26 January 2016
• Talk:2014–15 West and Central African cholera outbreak#Requested move 26 January 2016
• Talk:Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa#Requested move 26 January 2016
• Talk:First cholera pandemic (1817–24)#Requested move 26 January 2016
• Talk:Zika virus outbreak in Brazil (2015–present)#Requested move 25 January 2016

Feedback would be welcome! larryv (talk) 04:02, 27 January 2016 (UTC)

Requested move of Phi X 174

Please comment on the move request at Talk:Phi X 174. Plantdrew (talk) 18:34, 31 January 2016 (UTC)

Commendation

I commend the members of this project for keeping accurate assessments. --DThomsen8 (talk) 00:01, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Clarification needed at Mimivirus

Hello all! I stumbled upon the article Mimivirus recently, and noticed someone had tagged "clarification needed" on the table noting the virus structural symmetry (here). I had a look, but unfortunately, I'm not able to clarify what's meant here. I'm mildly-familiar with the T = # notation, but this one is a bit more involved. If anyone with more knowledge of this kind of thing could take a look and clarify that section (and remove the tag), that'd be great! Thanks a bunch! Happy editing! Ajpolino (talk) 23:31, 14 March 2016 (UTC)

Suggested Move of Mid-Importance Article

I have recently suggested the move of mid-importance article for this project, the West African Ebola virus epidemic to a new name. If anyone wants to look at the proposed move, it is at Talk:West_African_Ebola_virus_epidemic#Requested_move_9_May_2016. Just wanted to let this project know in case they have any discussion to add. Thanks, Gluons12 (talk) 20:00, 9 May 2016 (UTC).

Taxobox colour

I thought virus taxoboxes were meant to be purple? The default virus taxobox seems to be displaying as yellow at the moment. Espresso Addict (talk) 22:28, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Disclaimer: I know nothing about this. But, the taxobox documentation seems to indicate that viruses should be a pleasantly-light yellow color. So perhaps someone has enforced that. Hope that helps. Ajpolino (talk) 01:58, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

Yellow fever virus

YFV is one of the most important disease-causing arboviruses, yet there is no page specifically on the virus. A page modeled after the dengue virus page would be nice. The dengue fever page has been vetted to the extent that it has been published as a review article in a peer-reviewed journal. I expect the same effort went into creating the virus page. Are there any virology expert editors interested in taking it on? I'll follow the development and assist if I can. JuanTamad (talk) 02:08, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

Flexal virus

I've changed the infobox in the Flexal virus article to say "Genus: Mammarenavirus", which I think is correct, and added some words in the intro sentence to make the distinction as to what a mammarenavirus is: can someone with actual knowledge of virology check this, just in case, please? -- The Anome (talk) 09:25, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing my mistake in the genus in the infobox. I don't have any deep knowledge of virology, I just try to go with what the authoritative source has (the ICTV). Plantdrew (talk) 17:35, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

BioRxiv support in citations

Main page: Help_talk:Citation_Style_1 § BioRxiv_support

This project's feedback would be appreciated in this discussion, as this could greatly (and positively) affect biological citations! Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 21:55, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

Help with zygotic induction

Hey folks! I stumbled upon zygotic induction while looking through tagged microbiology articles. It currently consists of two sentences and is wholly incomprehensible to regular people. I'm not particularly familiar with phages or conjugation, so any chance someone a bit more familiar with the topic could take a look and clean it up? It has been tagged as "insufficient context" and "no refs" for 5 years. Maybe it's time it got cleaned up (or if there's not enough info out there to fill an article, maybe redirected somewhere). Thanks a bunch! Happy editing! Ajpolino (talk) 21:52, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

The topic is of historic significance. I'll try to expand it, although others are certainly welcome to help out. CatPath (talk) 15:53, 7 November 2016 (UTC)

Varicella Zoster Virus

I'm starting an expansion/revamping of the VZV page. While the diseases caused by this virus have relatively well developed pages (Shingles is rated as a GA), the page for the virus itself is sorely lacking. If anyone is interested in helping out let me know. Delyons13 (talk) 22:12, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

2016 Community Wishlist Survey Proposal to Revive Popular Pages

Greetings WikiProject Viruses/Archive 2 Members!

This is a one-time-only message to inform you about a technical proposal to revive your Popular Pages list in the 2016 Community Wishlist Survey that I think you may be interested in reviewing and perhaps even voting for:

• Fix and improve Mr.Z-bot's popular pages report

If the above proposal gets in the Top 10 based on the votes, there is a high likelihood of this bot being restored so your project will again see monthly updates of popular pages.

Further, there are over 260 proposals in all to review and vote for, across many aspects of wikis.

Thank you for your consideration. Please note that voting for proposals continues through December 12, 2016.

Best regards, Stevietheman — Delivered: 18:19, 7 December 2016 (UTC)