Re-imagining the virus

ABSTRACT This article tracks new conceptualizations of viruses both as a scientific object of study and a cultural object of fear and fascination. After World War II, the scientific study of viruses took on greater significance. The discovery of viral DNA and RNA revolutionized the understanding of microbial and human evolution. Technological innovations (electron microscopy, x-ray crystallography) and improvements in vaccine development gave scientists greater confidence in managing diseases such as polio and influenza. But in the 1980s, the emergence of HIV-AIDS, a deadly new virus that provoked intense stigma and discrimination, undercut that confidence. Scientific understandings of HIV led to more evolutionary, ecological views of disease origins; widely disseminated through the news and entertainment industries, those views inspired a newer, darker era of viral imaginaries. The identity of viruses as objects of scientific study, national security planning and popular culture have become difficult to disentangle as a result.