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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 viral core is one of the factors common to all infectious poxvirus forms.

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

Most researchers believe smallpox evolved from a rodent poxvirus that jumped to humans.

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

"We found that A10 defines key structural elements of the core of poxviruses," says Datler.

From Science Daily Feb. 5, 2024

Scientists have also found areas of deletions or rearrangements in some monkeypox genomes; these are common in poxviruses and haven’t yet been linked to a change in function.

From Scientific American Oct. 13, 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

But poxviruses don’t seem to require specific host receptors, enabling many to infect a wide range of mammalian cells.

From Science Magazine Jun. 7, 2022

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