Ranaviruses are pathogens of ectothermic vertebrates, including amphibians. We reviewed patterns of host range and virulence of ranaviruses in the context of virus genotype and postulate that patterns reflect significant variation in the historical and current host range of three groups of Ranavirus: FV3-like, CMTV-like and ATV-like ranaviruses. Our synthesis supports previous hypotheses about host range and jumps: FV3s are amphibian specialists, while ATVs are predominantly fish specialists that switched once to caudate amphibians. The most recent common ancestor of CMTV-like ranaviruses and FV3-like forms appears to have infected amphibians but CMTV-like ranaviruses may circulate in both amphibian and fish communities independently. While these hypotheses are speculative, we hope that ongoing efforts to describe ranavirus genetics, increased surveillance of host species and targeted experimental assays of susceptibility to infection and/or disease will facilitate better tests of the importance of hypothetical evolutionary drivers of ranavirus virulence and host range.

鼻病毒是包括两栖动物在内的外热脊椎动物的病原体。我们在病毒基因型的背景下审查了蛙病毒的宿主范围和毒力的模式，并假设该模式反映了三组蛙病毒的历史和当前宿主范围的显着差异：类似于FV3，类似于CMTV和类似ATV的病毒。我们的综合支持先前关于寄主范围和跳跃的假设：FV3是两栖动物专家，而ATV主要是鱼类专家，它们曾经转换为尾部两栖动物。像CMTV一样的Ranaviruses和FV3形式的最新共同祖先似乎感染了两栖动物，但是CMTV一样的Ranaviruses可能在两栖动物和鱼类群落中独立传播。尽管这些假设只是推测性的，但我们希望，通过不断的努力描述鼻病毒的遗传学，加强对宿主物种的监测以及针对感染和/或疾病的易感性的有针对性的实验分析，将有助于更好地检验假定的鼻病毒毒力和宿主范围的进化驱动因素的重要性。 。