Dataset: Phytoplankton virus life history traits

The literature was searched for studies that measured burst size and latent period of viruses isolated on phytoplankton or other microalgal hosts. We only included experiments where the host was grown under nutrient-replete conditions. We recorded the name of the virus strain, virus genome type (dsDNA/dsRNA/ssDNA/ssRNA), virus source location, host species, host taxon (chlorophyte/cryptophyte/cyanobacterium/diatom/dinoflagellate/haptophyte /pelagophyte/raphidophyte), and environment (marine/freshwater). We also recorded whether burst size was estimated by counting infectious units or free virions. Virus capsid size (diameter) and genome size estimates were taken from the same study, or other studies on the same isolate. Host genome size and cell volume estimates were taken from the literature, and if an estimate for the host species was not available, an estimate from a congener was used if available. It is noteworthy that 10 of the 13 single-stranded viruses have been isolated from Chaetoceros species, and, in the absence of published information on genome sizes for most of the hosts, we assigned all of the host species the same genome size (measured for C. muelleri). For the double-stranded viruses, genome size estimates were available for nearly all host species. When possible, host exponential growth rate was extracted from growth curves measured on uninfected hosts, or hosts growing prior to infection. Temperature and irradiance under which the hosts were cultured during one-step growth experiments were also recorded.