The genome of the fish virus Lymphocystis has been sequenced by scientists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, China.
The workers analysed a form of the virus found on the flounder Paralichthys olivaceus. The disease causes crusty deposits of malformed cells to develop on the skin and fins of a wide range of fish and has no known cure.
The analysis of the genome showed that there are in fact several different species of the virus, and a phylogenetic tree for the group has been proposed.
For more details see: Zhang QY, Xiao F, Xie J, Li ZQ, Gui JF. (2004) - Complete genome sequence of lymphocystis disease virus isolated from china. J Virol. 2004 Jul ; 78(13): 6982-94