Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Stealth-adapted virus


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   speedy deletion. (G12) -- Ed (Edgar181) 11:08, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Stealth-adapted virus

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This topic seems extremely fringe, and it is probably not deserving of it's own article. Irbisgreif (talk) 05:48, 22 October 2009 (UTC)


 * A quick survey of the scientific literature doesn't look good. There are only six papers in PubMed which actually use the term "stealth-adapted virus", and they all have the same, single author: W.J. Martin.  A broader search using "stealth virus" pulls just 25 hits, of which W.J. Martin is the (first, and usually only) author of 21.  In the remaining four papers, it often appears that 'stealth virus' is either employed as a casually-selected nonce word (and not a specific term of art) or used to describe a virus which is still recognized by the adaptive immune system but which does not necessarily trigger the innate immune system (which seems to be a different definition from that used in our article).
 * The article on Wikipedia is primarily being used as a coatrack to support a fringe theory of the cause of autism. The terms "stealth-adapted virus" and "stealth virus" (which redirects to the same article) appear not to be broadly accepted within the scientific community, and certainly not in the way our article describes it.  Consequently, Delete . TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:23, 22 October 2009 (UTC) Amended.  See comment below..

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Spartaz Humbug! 11:21, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete, fails WP:N, WP:V. Using Google Scholar/Books, I noticed the same thing as TenOfAllTrades found in PubMed, that  "stealth-adapted virus" seems to be used only by the one author and that the broader term "stealth virus" appears in more sources, but it seems to be used in a descriptive way rather than as a term with a specific technical definition.   Even if it turns out that there are enough sources for an article on the more general idea of "stealth virus", that article should not be developed starting with this page, because the two uses are different.  By the way, a couple years ago, I merged a stub article under that other title ("stealth virus") to this page because there was a stub that duplicated the content about Martin's "stealth-adapted virus".  At the time I added one source, figuring more sources would be found, but after two years no new sources have appeared, so it's time to delete. If it's deleted, the redirect should be deleted too. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 17:45, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep but Delete or rename to stealth virus. The concept was described expression can be found in a number of peer-reviewed publications, in particular in "A model for persistent infection with Epstein-Barr virus: The stealth virus of human B cells" by Thorley-Lawson DA, Babcock GJ Source: LIFE SCIENCES    Volume: 65    Issue: 14    Pages: 1433-1453. Biophys (talk) 03:12, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.


 * Responding to Biophys, above. The concept described in Thorley-Lawson and Babcock is different from the concept described in our article and promoted primarily (possibly solely) by W.J. Martin.  Martin's work (and our article derived therefrom) describes (putative) viruses which contain no immunogenic proteins, and which therefore provoke no immune response.  Thorley-Lawson and Babcock, on the other hand, are not using 'stealth virus' as a new term of art with a specific biological meaning; it's just a nonce term they cooked up to give their review article a catchy title.  (The word 'stealth' appears exactly twice in twenty-one pages: once in the title, and once in their conclusion.  No attempt is made to create or refer to a specific biological definition, as it is understood that the virus is 'hiding' and therefore 'stealthy'.)  T-L & B describe a virus that does produce immunogenic proteins, but which conceals itself by maintaining a latent population out of sight inside a relatively small number of quiescent B cells.
 * Unless someone can provide a reliable secondary source which presents a clear and broadly-accepted definition for what a 'stealth virus' is (as opposed to using the term as a one-off that sounds cool), this article still fails some combination of WP:NEOLOGISM, WP:COATRACK, and WP:FRINGE. The problems I observed in my original comment remain.  TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:35, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Obviously, any virus has immunogenic proteins.Biophys (talk) 05:12, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Yeah, that's one of the reasons why this article is absurd. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 05:42, 1 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Speedy delete &mdash; copyvio. I have nominated this article as a G12 speedy deletion candidate.  The original version of the article was an abridged copy & paste of this external site.  Since then, changes have been primarily cosmetic: diff from article creation to just prior to AfD nomination.  While any article on this topic is likely to be unsuitable for the reasons noted above, this version of the article should be speedy deleted as a copy & paste copyvio.  TenOfAllTrades(talk) 06:00, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.