Viruses sense chemical signals left behind by their forebears so they can decide whether to kill or just to infect their hosts. The discovery marks the first time that any type of viral communication system has ever been found. But researchers say that many other viruses could communicate with each other through their own molecular languages. 

This is going to be one of those transformative papers, says microbiologist Martha Clokie, who studies viruses that infect bacteria (known as bacteriophages, or phages) at the University of Leicester, UK.

Some phages can infect cells in two different ways. Usually, they hijack host cells and multiply until the hosts burst and die. Sometimes, however, phages insert their own genetic material into a host’s genome, then lie dormant until a trigger causes them to reawaken and multiply later. 

It does make a lot of sense, says Peter Fineran, a microbial geneticist at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand. If the phage is running out of hosts, it would try and limit its destruction, and sit quiet and wait for the host to re-establish growth. … Phages broadcast in different frequencies. They speak in different languages and they can hear only the language that they speak.

Nature doi:10.1038/nature.2017.21313

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