Dictionary.com
Thesaurus.com

poxvirus

American  
[poks-vahy-ruhs] / ˈpɒksˌvaɪ rəs /

noun

  • poxviruses
    plural
  1. any of a group of large, brick-shaped DNA-containing viruses that infect humans and other animals, including the viruses of smallpox and various other poxes.


Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms


Etymology

Origin of poxvirus

First recorded in 1940–45; pox + virus


Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

The findings, published in Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, could facilitate future research on therapeutics targeting the poxvirus core.

From Science Daily ● Feb. 5, 2024

Justice, in my mind, would be for your boss to have to go confess to the new gym owner that he passed along a potentially toxic candidate like a used tumbling mat covered with poxvirus.

From Washington Post ● Mar. 9, 2023

One “bad scenario,” says Bernard Moss, a veteran poxvirus researcher at the U.S.

From Science Magazine ● Sep. 15, 2022

In past outbreaks involving this poxvirus, animals — especially rodents — have been the primary source of transmission to humans.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 19, 2022

Vaccinia normally infects cattle and is a type of poxvirus, a family of viruses that includes smallpox and monkeypox.

From Salon ● Aug. 6, 2022

Importantly, this has highlighted the fundamental questions about poxviruses that have remained unanswered to this day.

From Science Daily ● Feb. 5, 2024

A June paper in Nature Medicine surprised researchers when it reported that the virus that was spreading through Europe had picked up single-letter mutations much faster than previous poxviruses had.

From Scientific American ● Oct. 13, 2022

And although poxviruses have ways of tricking the immune system, they don’t change their surface proteins to escape immunity, as SARS-CoV-2 does.

From Science Magazine ● Sep. 15, 2022

For now, only designated U.S. military personnel and laboratory researchers who work with certain poxviruses may receive this vaccine.

From Salon ● Aug. 6, 2022

Some experts have cautioned for years that the eradication of smallpox in 1980 left the world vulnerable to the broader family of poxviruses and raised the odds of monkeypox evolving into a successful human pathogen.

From New York Times ● Jun. 23, 2022

Random Word

Spin the wheel and learn a new word!

Get a word

Vocabulary.com logo
by dictionary.com

Join 14,000,000 vocabulary learners

Start learning new words today on VocabTrainer.
You'll remember them forever.

Start training