Molecular Virology Section, Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health Bethesda, Maryland 20892-0460, USA. yeungm@mail.nih.gov
Recent findings suggest that mammalian cells can use small non-coding RNAs (ncRNA) to regulate physiological viral infections. Here, we comment on several lines of evidence that support this concept. We discuss how viruses may in turn protect, suppress, evade, modulate, or adapt to the host cell's ncRNA regulatory schema.