Viruses are ubiquitous and often infect more than one host. Since decades, hundreds of scientists have performed experiments to characterize the host range of bacteriophages. The number of these experiments has dramatically increased the past few years because of the revived interest for phage therapy. However, results from these interaction tests are rarely published under an exploitable format easily accessible to the community.

We conceived the viral host range database (VHRdb, https://viralhostrangedb.pasteur.cloud///) as an online resource that centralizes experimental host range data. The VHRdb is a unique tool that allows users to identify suitable hosts for a given virus and conversely a list of viruses infecting specific hosts. Moreover, independent sets of data can be compared to generate, visualize and rank outputs.

The VHRdb is open to contribution by any user upon registration. Contributed data are public or can remain private until publication, if any. Links to publications and sequence identifiers can be implemented, when available. Initiated from data obtained from interaction tests between bacteriophages and bacteria, the design of the VHRdb is compatible with viruses infecting all living forms.

The VHRdb represents a unique resource for the community to rapidly find or disseminate the range of hosts suitable for a virus, an information that can have broad interest for educational, scientific, medical and applied purposes.

Here is the link to the associated publication:

https://academic.oup.com/bioinformatics/advance-article/doi/10.1093/bioinformatics/btab070/614078000