Study on flu evolution may change textbooks, history books
Monday, February 17, 2014 - 15:01
in Biology & Nature
A new study reconstructing the evolutionary tree of flu viruses challenges conventional wisdom and solves some of the mysteries surrounding flu outbreaks of historical significance. The study challenges several tenets of conventional wisdom -- for example, the notion that the virus moves largely unidirectionally from wild birds to domestic birds rather than with spillover in the other direction. It also helps resolve the origin of the virus that caused the unprecedentedly severe influenza pandemic of 1918.