Invasive fungal infections are relatively common opportunistic infections in immunocompromised patients and are still associated with a high mortality rate. Furthermore, these infections are often complicated by resistance or refractoriness to current antimicrobial agents. Therefore, an urgent need exists for new therapeutic strategies based on the identification of new microbial targets and novel antimicrobial agents. One such hypothetical therapeutic strategy may involve the use of mycoviruses that are able to selectively infect fungi. Current knowledge of mycoviruses of human pathogenic fungi and the scope for using (recombinant) mycoviruses as future biological control agents are reviewed here.

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doi.org/10.1007/s10096-010-0946-7, hdl.handle.net/1765/21121
European Journal of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases: an international journal on pathogenesis, diagnosis, epidemiology, therapy, and prevention of infectious diseases
Erasmus MC: University Medical Center Rotterdam

van de Sande, W., Lo-Ten-Foe, J., van Belkum, A., Netea, M., Kulberg, B. J., & Vonk, A. (2010). Mycoviruses: Future therapeutic agents of invasive fungal infections in humans?. European Journal of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases: an international journal on pathogenesis, diagnosis, epidemiology, therapy, and prevention of infectious diseases (Vol. 29, pp. 755–763). doi:10.1007/s10096-010-0946-7