Virology Division News : Report from the 33 rd Meeting of the ICTV Executive Committee
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Report from the 33rd Meeting of the ICTV Executive Committee L. A. Ball1 (President, ICTV) and M. A. Mayo2 (Secretary, ICTV) 1 Department
of Microbiology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama, U.S.A. 2 Scottish Crop Research Institute, Dundee, U.K.
The Executive Committee (EC) of the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) held its 33rd meeting at the Danforth Center in St Louis, U.S.A. from 1–4 of May 2003. Most of the meeting was concerned with taxonomic proposals. These are being considered by the ICTV membership and the results of those deliberations will be reported in a separate article in Virology Division News. This communication reports the principal items of business discussed at the meeting.
ICTV Newsletter The idea had been proposed of having a Newsletter communication sent to all those involved in ICTV activities. The editor of the Newsletter, Prof. Eric Carstens (elected member), had produced a draft. The production of such an ICTV Newsletter was thought to be a good idea and it was proposed that a frequency to aim for would be about one every 6 months. It was felt that the Newsletter should not be a vehicle for questions, rather it should be for indicating progress achieved and giving Study Group members and National Members a feeling of what is happening to taxonomic ideas brought to the EC. The first two editions of the Newsletter were distributed in June 2003 and February 2004.
Taxonomic proposals Proposals were reviewed that were at 2 stages of consideration. Those not seen previously by the EC consisted of 33 from the Vertebrate Virus Subcommittee, 19 from the Invertebrate Virus Subcommittee, 65 from the Plant Virus Subcommittee, 2 from the Fungus Virus Subcommittee and 4 from the Prokaryote Virus Subcommittee. Those seen once and being considered for recommendation to the ICTV membership for voting consisted of 28 from the Vertebrate Virus Subcommittee, 12 from the Plant Virus Subcommittee and 23 from the Prokaryote Virus Subcommittee. A ‘Fast Track’ procedure was designed for the rapid review of taxonomic proposals whereby non-controversial proposals would be considered in electronic form by EC members rather than at a regular EC meeting. The procedure was tested in September 2003 for the many taxonomic proposals stimulated by the imminence of the 8th ICTV Report, and EC member reactions to the procedure will be discussed at the next EC meeting.
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L. A. Ball and M. A. Mayo
Higher taxa A paper from Duncan McGeoch (Chair of the Vertebrate Virus Subcommittee) was discussed that reported progress in establishing a group to discuss how to approach the creation of useful higher taxa (at the level of Order and above). It was clear that common issues will arise in several areas of virology: the classification of retroelements, the diversity of viruses currently classified in families Reoviridae and Picornaviridae, and the classification of bacteriophages, in particular those in the Order Caudovirales.
Retroelement classification A discussion group is being s
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