Viruses are ubiquitous parasites of cellular life and the most abundant biological entities on
Earth. It is widely accepted that viruses are polyphyletic, but a consensus scenario for their …

Viruses and other selfish genetic elements are dominant entities in the biosphere, with
respect to both physical abundance and genetic diversity. Various selfish elements …

Life as we know it, simply would not exist without DNA replication. All living organisms utilize
a complex machinery to duplicate their genomes and the central role in this machinery …

We describe a second primase in human cells, PrimPol, which has the ability to start DNA
chains with deoxynucleotides unlike regular primases, which use exclusively …

Poxviruses are large, enveloped viruses that replicate in the cytoplasm and encode proteins
for DNA replication and gene expression. Hairpin ends link the two strands of the linear …

Viruses and mobile genetic elements are molecular parasites or symbionts that coevolve
with nearly all forms of cellular life. The route of virus replication and protein expression is …

DNA replication forks that collapse during the process of genomic duplication lead to double-
strand breaks and constitute a threat to genomic stability. The risk of fork collapse is higher …

Background Recent advances in genomics of viruses and cellular life forms have greatly
stimulated interest in the origins and evolution of viruses and, for the first time, offer an …

DNA damage can stall the DNA replication machinery, leading to genomic instability. Thus,
numerous mechanisms exist to complete genome duplication in the absence of a pristine …

The last universal cellular ancestor (LUCA) is the most recent population of organisms from
which all cellular life on Earth descends. The reconstruction of the genome and phenotype …