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J. Virol. doi:10.1128/JVI.02207-07
Copyright (c) 2008, American Society for Microbiology and/or the Listed Authors/Institutions. All Rights Reserved.

Phylogenetic evidence against evolutionary stasis and natural abiotic reservoirs of influenza A virus

Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Biosciences West, 1041 E Lowell St., University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, 85721

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: worobey{at}email.arizona.edu.

	Abstract

Zhang et al. [J. Virol. 80:12229-12235] claim to have recovered influenza A virus RNA from Siberian lake ice, postulating that ice might represent an important abiotic reservoir for the persistence and re-emergence of this medically important pathogen. A rigorous phylogenetic analysis of these influenza A hemagglutinin gene sequences, however, indicates that they originated from a laboratory reference strain derived from the earliest human influenza A isolate, "WS/33". Contrary to Zhang et al.'s assertions that the Siberian "ice viruses" are most closely related either to avian influenza virus, or to human influenza strains from Asia from the 1960s [J. Virol. 81:2538], they are clearly contaminants from the WS/33 positive-control used in their laboratory. There is thus no credible evidence that environmental ice acts as a biologically relevant reservoir for influenza viruses. Several additional cases with findings that seem at odds with the biology of influenza virus – including modern-looking avian influenza virus RNA sequences from an archival goose specimen collected in 1917 [J. Virol. 76:7860-7862] – can an also be explained by laboratory contamination or other experimental errors. Many putative examples of evolutionary stasis in influenza A virus appear to be due to laboratory artifacts.

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