为Virologica绘制的封面

Human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs) are remnants of ancient exogenous retroviruses (XRV) infected in the germ line cells of our ancestors over millions of years. Nowadays, HERV has become an important part of human genome and would provide important biological functions. In this issue, Wang et al. analyzed large-scale transcriptome sequencing data of human cells infected with various viruses, including influenza A and B virus, Zika virus, hepatitis C virus, measles virus, West Nile virus, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever virus, respiratory syncytial virus, rhinovirus, Epstein Barr virus, and SARS-CoV-2. They found that a variety of viral infections could induce HERV activity to varying degrees, and identified 43 shared key HERVs. Interestingly, the key HERV sites reported here are adjacent to the interferon-stimulated genes and upregulated simultaneously. These results strongly suggest that HERVs are involved in host antiviral immunity, and the HERV gene locus may be a target for antiviral drug development. The cover image describes that the antiviral power gained from the transcriptional activation of HERV loci (the shining stars) would protect humans from viral infections (kindly provided by Miao Wang and Di Liu). Please see page 1315–1326 for details.