Predicting Nature papers

A while back I did a journal club about microRNAs predicted to be expressed by viruses. Pretty much all of it was computational prediction. A new Nature paper (link to summary) shows that HSV-1 inhibits neuronal death during a latent infection through a microRNA mechansim inhibiting TGF-B and SMAD3 validating my journal club as worthwhile. These genes are central targets but the paper points to a great unbiased approach to find key genes. Viral microRNAs must have evolved to target some pretty important genes. Interesting to see what will be next.