Report from the 40th meeting of the Executive Committee of the International Committee of Taxonomy of Viruses
- PDF / 104,280 Bytes
- 4 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 61 Downloads / 205 Views
VIROLOGY DIVISION NEWS
Report from the 40th meeting of the Executive Committee of the International Committee of Taxonomy of Viruses E. B. Carstens
Received: 8 May 2009 / Accepted: 5 July 2009 / Published online: 19 July 2009 Ó Springer-Verlag 2009
Abstract The Executive Committee (EC) of the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) held its 40th meeting at the Istanbul Convention and Exhibition Centre in Istanbul, Turkey, from August 7 to 9, 2008. This was just prior to the XIV International Congress of Virology (ICV), part of the joint meeting organized by the International Union of Microbiological Societies (IUMS), also in Istanbul, Turkey, from August 11 to 15, 2008. Most of the EC meeting was concerned with the discussion of taxonomic proposals. This communication reports the principal items of business discussed at the meeting.
Taxonomic proposals from EC39 As published separately [1], for the first time, taxonomic proposals approved at the EC39 meeting and awaiting ratification were sent to members of ICTV via e-mail with a request to vote by return e-mail within 1 month. Members of ICTV include Life Members, the various Subcommittee Members, and National Representatives. The response rate to this request was about 37%, and all proposals were accepted. ICTV continues to work to improve the lines of communication with its members, especially with the National Representatives, to improve this response rate. It is anticipated that future ratification votes will be carried out by e-mail.
E. B. Carstens (&) Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON K7L 3N6, Canada e-mail: [email protected]
ICTVon-line The ICTV Database (ICTVdb) SC is primarily responsible for developing and maintaining a database of virus isolates (see ‘‘ICTVdatabase’’ below) but has taken on the additional task of developing the official ICTV web site. The ICTVdb Subcommittee (SC) presented information about the new ICTV official web site http://www.ictvonline.org, where information about current virus taxonomy can be obtained. There are also links to the ICTV database pages, news and information, a directory of ICTV committee members, and all taxonomic proposals. A second ICTV discussion site has also been implemented at http://talk.ictvonline.org/, where detailed information about ICTV and the submission of taxonomic proposals is provided. This forum provides an opportunity for users to discuss and comment on any ICTV issue. Registration is free. Viewers are encouraged to click on ‘‘Join’’ in the upper right-hand window and follow the instructions. All virologists are particularly encouraged to read and comment on new taxonomic proposals as they appear on-line. ICTV has also prepared a template module for taxonomic proposals and a help file, both of which are available at http://talk.ictvonline.org/. This module is designed to assist Study Groups (SGs) to prepare and submit to SubCommittee (SC) chairs taxonomic proposals in a consistent and complete format. At EC40, it was strongly resolved
Data Loading...
