Key result
This review summarizes experimental methods for estimating viral mutation rates and their implications for pathogenesis, vaccine efficacy, antiviral resistance, and epidemiological surveillance.
Understanding viral mutation rates and evolution is crucial for designing rational antiviral therapies and effective epidemiological surveillance.
Supports mutation rate data for antiviral resistance surveillance; leaves open standardized clinical translation pending validation.
Mutation rates vary hugely across viruses and strongly determine their evolution. In addition, viral mutation and evolution are biomedically relevant because they can determine pathogenesis, vaccine efficacy and antiviral resistance. We review experimental methods for estimating viral mutation rates and how these estimates vary across viral groups, paying special attention to the more general trends. Recent advances positing a direct association between viral mutation rates and virulence, or the use of high-fidelity variants as attenuated vaccines, are also discussed. Finally, we review the implications of viral mutation and evolution for the design of rational antiviral therapies and for efficient epidemiological surveillance.
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Sanjuán et al. (2012) conducted a review in Viral mutation and evolution. This review summarizes experimental methods for estimating viral mutation rates and their implications for pathogenesis, vaccine efficacy, antiviral resistance, and epidemiological surveillance.
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