2: The First Virus

How do you look for something invisible? Today, I would like to go to the very beginning of the virology field. To the time when people only started to realize that viruses exist and can cause diseases. Because this required a whole shift in how people thought about infection. 

So, let me tell you a story, about the first virus ever discovered.

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Sources:

M. Zaitlin, 1998: The Discovery of the Causal Agent of the Tobacco Mosaic Disease 

KBG Scholthof, 2008: Tobacco Mosaic Virus: The Beginning of Plant Virology

MH Van Regenmortel, 2008: Tobacco Mosaic Virus

M. Karamanou, 2012: From miasmas to germs: a historical approach to theories of infectious disease transmission

ANH Creager, 2022: Tobacco Mosaic Virus and the History of Molecular Biology