[Advance in Deep Sequencing of Small RNAs for Virus Identification and Discovery]

Small RNAs (sRNA) are produced abundantly in either plants or animals and function in regulating gene expression or in defense against virus infection. Deep sequencing of small RNAs is an emerging technology in virus identification and de novo assembly of virus genomes and is demonstrated to be an effective method to discover new viruses and monitor virus variation. A significant number of viruses from plants, invertebrates and human cells has been successfully identified using this technology. In this paper, we summarized the principle, operation process and latest advances of sRNA deep sequencing We also showed the feasibility of sRNA deep sequencing by bioinformatic analysis using sRNA deep sequencing dataset public available for the detection of viruses.