Talk:Epstein–Barr virus

How do children end up getting it?

One of the things that is not discussed in the article is how children end up getting the virus. I'm sure that children are not kissing other children, thus that cannot be the major cause of how children get the EB virus. As such, I'm assuming the get it from some other kind of contact. Again, the article does not really address this. It's possible that a child is kissing their parents on the lips, thus the parent transfers the illness to the child. Otherwise, I cannot see how else a child is getting this illness. I know that many children will get chickenpox, as I can recall in kindergarten a girl giving another child chickenpox. --Cyberman (talk) 01:07, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

I added a line and a reference to the page on Epstein-Barr virus infection that describes a likely route for the infection of children (mouth feeding or pre-chewing of children's food by adults). I'll try and find a way to work this into the main article. Walternmoss (talk) 15:50, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

Overhauling the Article

I am in the process of overhauling this article. I am modeling it after HIV and other virus articles labeled as "good". Feel free to lend me a hand or offer suggestions. Kadoshim (talk) 00:08, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Proposed merge: Yvonne Barr → Epstein–Barr virus

WP:BLP1E. -- Patchy1 01:00, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

This proposed merge has not been objected to. I will carry out the merge. -- Patchy1 00:43, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

Direct quote not labeled

The sentences followed by footnotes #8 and #9 are direct copies of the text at footnote 8's source, but without quote marks or attribution for the paragraph. Shouldn't this be set off as a block quote, or rewritten in non-plagiarized form? Arrataz (talk) 05:58, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Requested move

• Epstein–Barr virus → Epstein-Barr virus
• Category:Epstein–Barr virus → Category:Epstein-Barr virus
• Epstein–Barr vaccine → Epstein-Barr vaccine
• Epstein–Barr virus viral capsid antigen → Epstein-Barr virus viral capsid antigen
• EBV latent membrane protein 1 → Epstein-Barr virus latent membrane protein 1
• EBV nuclear antigen 2 → Epstein-Barr virus nuclear antigen 2
• EBV nuclear antigen 3 → Epstein-Barr virus nuclear antigen 3
• Epstein-Barr nuclear antigen 1 → Epstein-Barr virus nuclear antigen 1

– I think it best to rename pages to have consistent nomenclature: within EBV-related wikipages and with regards to the scientific literature (e.g. using uniform nomenclature for the Epstein-Barr nuclear antigens (EBNAs)). Importantly, in the literature on Epstein-Barr virus the en dash is not used to connect Epstein and Barr, but a hyphen is used: as is shown in The International Committee on the Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) entry for Epstein-Barr virus. Practically speaking, interchanging hyphens, en dashes, and em dashes might cause problems for search algorithms or for citation/indexing purposes and thus it is important to keep wikipedia entries consistent with each other and with the nomenclature/punctuation used by the scientific community. Additionally, the hyphenated form complies with the Wikipedia Manual of style: WP:ENDASH) where it states "A hyphen is used by default in compounded proper names of single entities." Walternmoss (talk) 23:45, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

• Oppose using a hyphen where an endash is technically appropriate, as indicated by Wikipedia policy (WP:ENDASH), but support writing out EBV or adding "virus" to "Epstein–Barr" for precision and clarity. --JorisvS (talk) 16:02, 15 November 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose. The dash for co-discoverers is correct, and not just per our MOS. That fact that i.a. Robertson (2010) Epstein–Barr Virus: Latency and Transformation uses the dash shows that there's nothing wrong with it. As for the ICTV site, they even use hyphens for ranges, as do print sources I've seen which use the hyphen, so they're not saying anything about the proper formatting of the name.
  Also oppose adding 'virus', at least without a better proposal, as double hyphenation could be problematic. But several of the names do need cleaning up: What's a "virus viral antigen"? (rhetorical question) — kwami (talk) 16:16, 15 November 2013 (UTC)
• Support. I now support uniformly using en dashes. Please ignore my comments that contradict this position below. Also, please see table (far) below for updated suggestions for changes to page namesThe vast majority of publications on EBV, despite the one cited above, use a hyphen (based on my own experience and perusal of Google Scholar results). In addition to ICTV publications, other reliable sources also hyphenate Epstein-Barr: e.g. The Centers for Disease Control, Encyclopedia Britannica, even the wikipage on Virus classification. Rather than consistently replacing hyphens in EBV wikipages with en dashes, it seems easier to alter the few pages with en dashes to conform to what is found in the majority of scientific literature. Walternmoss (talk) 18:52, 15 November 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose changes of en-dash to hyphen. Wikipedia has a house style, as documented in WP:ENDASH, and should follow it: "An en dash is used for the names of two or more people in an attributive compound." Sourcing is not especially relevant to styling issues. If Wikipedia's MoS is not appropriate, it should be changed rather than ignored. Otherwise, redirects will suffice for alternative variants. —BarrelProof (talk) 22:17, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

From the same section of the Manual of Style (four lines down in WP:ENDASH) it states "A hyphen is used by default in compounded proper names of single entities." Though named after two people, the name "Epstein-Barr virus" is the proper name of a single entity (the virus). Thus, by these standards the endashes should be replaced by hyphens.Walternmoss (talk) 02:08, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

The wording is indeed rather incoherent. But the examples should make it clear what was intended. — kwami (talk) 11:14, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

The MoS examples do make it clear: for example when it states, "McGraw-Hill, a publishing house named after two founders" should be hyphenated. This illustrates well my point that the Epstein-Barr virus (the name of a single entity named for two discovers) should be hyphenated...as it is done in almost all scientific/technical literature, text books, official publications, and even most wikipedia articles.Walternmoss (talk) 12:33, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

There is a difference between "McGraw-Hill" or "Wilkes-Barre", for which the hyphenated strings are used "substantively (as a noun: she is a 34-year-old)", and "Epstein–Barr virus" or "Black–Scholes equation" or similar uses for which the dashed string is used "attributively (adjectives before the nouns they qualify: a light-blue handbag, a 34-year-old woman)". (Template quotes here are quotes from MOS:HYPHEN.) —BarrelProof (talk) 20:07, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

• Support. It seems by Wikipedia's Manual of Style a hyphen is to be used in Epstein-Barr virus since it is a single entity: "A hyphen is used by default in compounded proper names of single entities... e.g McGraw-Hill, a publishing house named after two founders."Ldelamoss (talk) 02:41, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

I think you're misreading the MOS. That exemption is for a few cases which are never dashed. In this case we have academic refs which do dash. — kwami (talk) 11:11, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

In what manner is this a misreading of the MoS? The given example exactly supports the argument that Epstein-Barr virus should be hyphenated. Epstein-Barr virus is always hyphenated except for a small minority of refs. (most likely due to a copy editor incorrectly adding an en dash). I just ran a PubMed search to find the very latest paper on Epstein-Barr virus; as of 7:06 am (EST) the most recent paper is: "Activation of MSRV-Type Endogenous Retroviruses during Infectious Mononucleosis and Epstein-Barr Virus Latency: The Missing Link with Multiple Sclerosis?" Mameli G, (et. al) PLoS One. 2013 Nov 13;8(11):e78474. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0078474. You can search yourself and scroll down the latest results (or the thousands of results spanning the last ~50 years of research on EBV) and see that hyphens are essentially always used in Epstein-Barr virus. Moreover, if you follow links in my previous comments, you will see that it is hyphenated in publications from official sources, such as the CDC and the international committee on the taxonomy of viruses. There is no ambiguity here. We have rules (and examples) in the MoS that clearly supports a hyphen; we have decades of publications using hyphens; we have official organizations using hyphens; I've worked on viruses for almost a decade and (before this debate) I have never encountered Epstein-Barr virus with a dash in papers or at meetings. Unless we want the EBV-related wikipages to contradict the MoS and almost the entirety of the body of scientific work on EBV, the dashes should be replaced with hyphens. Walternmoss (talk) 12:33, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

How can you say I am misreading the MoS? That rule states in plain English what Wikipedia wants a writer to do concerning joining names for a single entity. So are Epstein and Barr not two names (named after the British scientists M.A. Epstein and Y.M. Barr), or is the virus not a single entity? You say: "That exemption is for a few cases which are never dashed", however, that is exactly what we are saying. McGraw-Hill is not dashed, it is hyphenated. As is Epstein-Barr virus, which is not dashed but hyphenated. Even for family names, a hyphen is used instead of a dash. You also state that references/journal articles use an en dash; then how do you explain hundreds upon hundreds of articles that use the hyphen vs the scarce few that use the en dash? Ldelamoss (talk) 14:59, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

It's badly worded. If you'll take a look at the actual examples, you'll see that all of them are single entities. So that phrase is meaningless. — kwami (talk) 16:40, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

"A hyphen is used by default in compounded proper names of single entities" is not "meaningless. It clearly defines a policy on punctuating names of entities (like EBV). Actual examples? You were given one. Here's another from the same section of the MoS: "Wilkes-Barre, a single city named after two people". You were also presented with evidence that the hyphenated form of EBV is widely used in scientific and technical lit. It's also widely used in text books (e.g. Freeman, Scott (2002). Biological Science. Prentice Hall 0-13-081923-9. {{cite book}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help)), meaning that a key wikipedia audience (college students) would be confused by the inconsistent punctuation. You keep ignoring these important facts, and ignoring parts of the MOS that you conveniently find "meaningless", and I don't understand why. Walternmoss (talk) 17:25, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

It is not badly worded. If you are talking about the examples used to combine two or more names by an en dash in the MoS, such as: the Seifert–van Kampen theorem, the Seeliger–Donker-Voet scheme, the Alpher–Bethe–Gamow theory, please note that these are not single entities but theories/ideas/concepts. The Hale-Bopp comet on the other hand is an incorrect example and should be in the category I am talking about because it is combining two names to form a proper name for a single entity.Ldelamoss (talk) 19:47, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

• Comment Whereas spelling out the name for the virus article is appropriate, the use of "EBV" in the longer article names is both easier to read and common usage - so I do not support expanding those. The vaccine article should be "EBV vaccine", because "Epstein-Barr" is not a disease or syndrome. -- Scray (talk) 15:55, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

I think this is a very reasonable idea and a good way to make the EBV articles more consistent. If "EBV" is consistently used in all title pages, other than the main Epstein-Barr virus page, I think that would be quite good. In particular, because the intro text of each can define the acronym EBV I suppose search engines would still pick these pages up. Walternmoss (talk) 17:04, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

• Comment I support Scray's idea to consistently use the EBV acronym in all but the main page. However, in the title of the main page and in the body of each article, Epstein-Barr virus should be hyphenated. Please allow me to summarize/re-iterate my current arguments and evidence:

1. From the Wikipedia Manual of Style (WP:ENDASH) it states "A hyphen is used by default in compounded proper names of single entities." Examples given in the MoS illustrate the use of a hyphen to connect compound proper names of entities such as cities, "Wilkes-Barre" and corporations "McGraw-Hill". A virus, such as Epstein-Barr, named for two scientists should follow this rule.
2. The vast majority of scientific literature uses the hyphenated form of Epstein-Barr virus: e.g. this search for EBV on PubMed, where, when the virus name appears in a title, the hyphenated form is used 97.9% of the time (12597 entries).
3. Text books, read by a major target audience of Wikipedia (students), use the hyphenated form of EBV: (e.g. Freeman, Scott (2002). Biological Science. Prentice Hall 0-13-081923-9. {{cite book}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help)).
4. The Centers for Disease Control uses the hyphenated form: Epstein-Barr Virus and Infectious Mononucleosis.
5. The World Health Organization uses the hyphenated form: Infectious Diseases.

Not following the near unanimous punctuation of Epstein-Barr virus in scientific, technical, medical, educational and government publications makes NO SENSE, particularly when it also would contradict the cited precedent in the MoS. It can only cause confusion by introducing irregular punctuation into "the world of ideas". Walternmoss (talk) 17:52, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

The usage is not at all unanimous. The WHO is inconsistent in its usage see here [1] and there are others. Looking at the books on my shelf I see a dash is used here [2] but a hyphen is used here [3] and here [4], but a dash is used here [5]. I can see other inconsistencies among my collection, but Google views are not available. I think the variation is because of the house styles of the publications. In which case we should stick to our house style. I think we are making a lot of fuss over a trivial issue - most readers won't notice whether it is a -, –, or —. Although I agree with Scray wrt the use of the acronym. Graham Colm (talk) 19:39, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia's house style (the MoS), states that "A hyphen is used by default in compounded proper names of single entities." Please clarify if you then support the idea of using a hyphen instead of an en dash for EBV articles. I also concede that one sometimes finds an en dash in publications, but much less frequently than the hyphenated form (as seen in PubMed). I think it is best to keep wikipedia consistent within itself and with the bulk of literature. I'm sorry to make this fuss over a triviality, but this is does not feel trivial to me. Walternmoss (talk) 20:13, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

PubMed is inconsistent too.[6]. For what it is worth, I think the endash should be retained. Graham Colm (talk) 20:23, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

OK. But if the en dash is retained in the main page, should it also be changed in the body of the other pages (assuming we switch to "EBV" in the titles of these pages, which I think is a good idea)? In most of these pages it's currently hyphenated. Also, in the 30539 entries returned for searching for EBV in pubmed, the virus name is used 12867 times in titles. Of these 12867 titles, the hyphenated form of "Epstein-Barr virus" is used 97.9% of the time (in 12597 entries). This seems pretty consistent to me. Walternmoss (talk) 03:18, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Please see the comment above regarding substantive versus attributive constructions. Here, the use is attributive, which indicates the use of an en-dash. The "single entity" issue is a red herring. The noun here is the word "virus", not the prefixing phrase "Epstein–Barr", which is an attributive qualifier to used identify the specific virus. The full phrase here is "Epstein–Barr virus", not "Epstein–Barr" by itself. —BarrelProof (talk) 20:56, 17 November 2013 (UTC)

BarrelProof, thank you for the information. I don't mean to be argumentative, but I don't really understand your explanation (I'm not an expert in the rules of grammar/style and can't find a clear rule anywhere). As the full name of McGraw-Hill is something like McGraw-Hill Education (or something like this), isn't this a similar situation as the Epstein-Barr virus? I'm also not sure what you mean by the "single entity" bit in the MoS being a red herring. It seems to point to the hyphenated form of EBV being kosher for wikipedia. I'm fairly confused by the rules, but I'm not keen on "throwing in the towel" if there's any ambiguity in the MoS. If we're going to err, I'd prefer to do so on the side of ~98% of published articles on EBV. Walternmoss (talk) 03:18, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

I also make no claim of expertise on grammatical matters. I am only looking at the guidance provided in the MoS. I have quoted it above for convenience. It refers to "substantive" and "attributive" uses. It says that substantive use is usage as a noun, and that attributive use is usage as an adjective before a noun (such as 'virus') that it qualifies. Its examples of substantive use are "Guinea-Bissau", "Wilkes-Barre", "John Lennard-Jones", and "McGraw-Hill". It did not use "McGraw-Hill Education" as one of its examples, and perhaps that might be attributive use (personally, I'm not sure about that phrase). The examples of attributive use include "the Seifert–van Kampen theorem; the Seeliger–Donker-Voet scheme; the Alpher–Bethe–Gamow theory". Each of those are a single entity (a theorem, a scheme, a theory), but they also involve "the names of two or more people in an attributive compound", as presumably would be the names of two or more people used as a qualifier to identify a particular virus. —BarrelProof (talk) 04:51, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. I was confused by "entity" this makes more sense now. Walternmoss (talk) 13:44, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

That's as good an explanation as I've seen. Really, it's about exceptions. Based on the general rule, you'd expect "McGraw-Hill" to be dashed, but it's hyphenated because it's no longer seen as the company founded by McGraw and Hill, but as a single entity of its own. I think the substantive use ties into this: We call it just "McGraw-Hill", without "company", precisely because it is no longer felt to be a union of two names. But the virus is seen as being named after its two discoverers, and we don't drop the word "virus". Also, while the majority of sources may use hyphens for dashes as a general rule (many of them even use hyphens for date and page ranges, which is a no brainer), there are sources which are careful enough to use the dash with the virus. But no-one, AFAIK, dashes "McGraw-Hill". — kwami (talk) 07:46, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

It is indeed a good explanation. The interpretation still seems pretty subjective to me. Walternmoss (talk) 13:44, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

This is a helpful explanation. I think also companies are entitled to define the form of their own names, even if that breaks grammatical rules. If McGraw-Hill has chosen the hyphen we should follow that, as we spell World Health Organization with a z even in articles using the -ise spelling. Espresso Addict (talk) 10:43, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

• Oppose. In my experience as a virologist & medical editor, it is usually referred to with an en dash in print publications, though there's some sloppy use of the hyphenated form online. We should not follow it. The current MoS is simply wrong if it implies otherwise, but I suspect it is being misread in this instance. I also think moving a heavily linked page should not be undertaken lightly. Espresso Addict (talk) 10:35, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

  Yes, it is just unclear about it. I'll see what happens if I try to phrase it more clearly, in line with has been said here. --JorisvS (talk) 10:49, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

I found very few of articles indexed in PubMed used an en dash. I have no way to quantify printed text books, but the ones in my collection have it hyphenated. Also, most of the print PDFs of the articles in the references cited in the EBV wikipage use hyphens: all but one that I've found so far. That being said, I've pored over the "key" or "historic" literature. The first usage of EBV, in 1968, spelled out EBV as "EB virus" so this is no help. However, the article reporting the discovery of the EBERs (which I need to add to the EBER page ASAP) does use an en dash: "Two small RNAs encoded by Epstein–Barr virus and complexed with protein are precipitated by antibodies from patients with systemic lupus erythematosus." PNAS (1981) 78(2): 805–809. I found several other "ancient" refs. that use an en dash. My feeling, however, is that this punctuation is dying out. For example: in more recent Steitz lab papers EBV is hyphenated. Walternmoss (talk) 13:44, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

• I may well be showing my age, but I think it's a huge shame that the prevalence of online works is making the en rule in general rarer and losing a useful distinction. To me following suit seems like deliberately spelling something incorrectly because it's wrongly spelled in the majority of Google hits, or using netspeak grammar... Espresso Addict (talk) 15:03, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Indeed. The more I've mulled this over, the more I see the utility of the en dash. My wife hyphenates her name, so if she ever makes a famous discovery with a collaborator it would be very helpful! Maybe I'm showing MY age, but what sparked my initial confusion was never seeing the en dash in EBV anywhere else (not only on the web, but the print PDFs of most articles). Neither I nor any of my lab-mates use it in our papers on EBV. Maybe I'll buck the trend in the next paper... Walternmoss (talk) 15:24, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

• Comment. My attitude w/r to the en dash is softening. Despite being in a small minority of papers, I've found several "key" references that use an en dash in their printed form. Recent papers however, mostly use the hyphenated form. My feeling is that the en dash in EBV, used infrequently (but in some important papers), is something of an "endangered species". I can only imagine that as more journals move to on-line only formats that the en dash in EBV will be dead soon. By forcing this punctuation on Wikipedia's EBV entries we'd be on the wrong side of history (so to speak), but so be it. It looks like consensus is moving towards consistently applying the en dash and changing all but the main Epstein-Barr page to EBV. Is this correct? Walternmoss (talk) 13:44, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

  I still don't like using the acronym, and especially in the titles. It makes these titles less accessible than they could be. The question "what does EBV stand for?" could easily arise in readers' minds, and they'd have to look for it. Granted, they will quickly find it, but this step of confusion is unnecessary. Are there any counterarguments except 'having to write "Epstein–Barr-virus ..."', with the extra hyphen for proper parsing? --JorisvS (talk) 13:57, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Good point about "EBV" causing a barrier. It seemed like a reasonable compromise...but I agree that ideally it would be consistently spelled out in the titles. I'm willing to concede on the use of the en dash (which is seldom used in publications and, in my opinion, somewhat anachronistic), but at least has important historical precedents. "Epstein–Barr-virus" however, I can't support. It is not used in the articles archived in PubMed. So far as I know it has never been printed in this way. Walternmoss (talk) 15:10, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

I understand your resistance. Without it, though, one gets, for example, "Epstein–Barr virus viral capsid antigen", and then the question "what is a virus viral capsid antigen" (akin to Kwami's rhetorical question above "what's a virus viral antigen") becomes legit. An expert may understand that this should be parsed differently, but the layperson in general does not. --JorisvS (talk) 15:46, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Likewise, I understand how adding hyphens may be very useful in increasing understandability in some cases. My argument here would be that the layperson might not know the meaning anyhow, until they read the article and follow links to define terms like "capsid" and "antigen". Most likely that person will be reading the term in a paper or text book and seeking additional info on Wikipedia. If, in those publications, it's written without hyphens, then seeing such different punctuation will do more harm then good: trying to connect the hyphens in a complicated name is harder to me then just reading the intro paragraph. For example, when we named the Epstein-Barr virus stable intronic sequence RNAs in our paper, we did not add hyphens. Doing so (to me) will be really awkward and unlikely to help any reader understand what this RNA really is. In the originating paper, the name is used once and then shortened to ebv-sisRNA-1. Likewise the EBV nuclear antigens are defined once then abbreviated to EBNAs; the latent membrane proteins (LMPs), etc. If we try and hyphenate all these terms it will be a mess. I really doubt if we can capture what the primary authors intended, and I think it's best to defer to the original/widely-used naming scheme for these articles. This way, there's no risk of hyphens linking things not intended to be linked by the scientist/author...which, in my mind is a huge danger if we attempt this. Walternmoss (talk) 17:20, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

• Comment. My attitude towards the en dash has warmed up greatly. Reading my above commentary, I apologize for getting so "hot under the collar". I really did not mean to be argumentative or insulting...it just seemed so wrong to defy what appears to be much of the literature w/r to punctuation of EBV. Others have given good reasons for using an en dash in EBV and I revise my previous position and support this change. We still need to figure out what to do with the inconsistent tiles. From JorisvS' arguments I also think spelling out the acronyms in the main page is probably the best option. However, I think when writing them out we should use the form used in the originating literature and not add hyphens or alter them in any other way then replacing the en dash. So far as I can tell, the en dash and hyphen are treated the same in searches; so I don't think we even need to re-direct from dashed pages. I do, however, think that we should have redirects for the acronyms, which are very commonly used: e.g. EBERs would be expanded to "Epstein–Barr virus-encoded small RNAs" in the title in order to match the the literature, but we could have a redirect from the commonly used EBER acronym so that searches and links to this will go to the main page. Likewise the "Epstein–Barr virus" page could have redirects from "EBV". In this way all the EBV-related pages will be consistent, in-line with the literature, use good punctuation that (I guess) follows the MoS, and also connects the commonly-used acronyms for these entities to the main pages. If you all can bear with me, I will carefully read the literature for each page and suggest titles that correspond to these sources. Walternmoss (talk) 18:36, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
• Note Unfortunately, categories can't be renamed through RM. If this request is successful, the relevant category can be speedily renamed at WP:CFDS. Use criteria C2D and C2A. --BDD (talk) 19:49, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, however, I think most of the people discussing this, including myself now, agree on the en dash used for EBV-related wikipedia entries. Walternmoss (talk) 21:16, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

• Comment. I've done my best to regularize the proposed naming for EBV-related wikipages. The table below shows the current name, the revised proposed name, the current acronyms/abbreviations (when possible taken from the official "gene names" in the NCBI), and the PubMed PMID#s for literature that supports the proposed name. I tried to find the earliest papers that report names that correspond to the current acronyms/abbreviations (where possible). All proposed pages use the en dash for Epstein–Barr virus. When hyphenation is used in the name, it is taken from the PubMed reference. If the main page names are changed to the proposed ones, I suggest also making pages to redirect from the acronyms/abbreviations, as these will be very commonly searched for and recognized by scientists, students, etc. I hope this is a step in the right direction and can help us move towards some kind of consensus. Walternmoss (talk) 21:16, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Current Wikipedia name	Proposed Wikipedia name	Acronyms/abbreviation(s)	PMID
EBER	Epstein–Barr virus-encoded small RNAs	EBER, EBER1, EBER2	62627738159770
EBV latent membrane protein 1	Epstein–Barr virus latent membrane protein 1	LMP1	1648447
EBV nuclear antigen 2	Epstein–Barr virus nuclear antigen 2	EBNA-2	620971924167291
EBV nuclear antigen 3	Epstein–Barr virus nuclear antigen 3	EBNA-3	215763124094498
Epstein-Barr nuclear antigen 1	Epstein–Barr virus nuclear antigen 1	EBNA-1	283679524094498
Epstein–Barr vaccine	Epstein–Barr virus vaccine	EBV vaccine	18190254
Epstein–Barr virus	no change	EBV	5695007
Epstein-Barr virus nuclear antigen (EBNA) IRES	Epstein–Barr virus nuclear antigen internal ribosomal entry site	EBNA IRES	12555070
Epstein-Barr virus snoRNA1	Epstein–Barr virus small nucleolar RNA 1	v-snoRNA1	19680535
Epstein-Barr virus stable intronic sequence RNAs	Epstein–Barr virus stable intronic sequence RNAs	ebv-sisRNA, ebv-sisRNA-1	23937650
Epstein–Barr virus viral capsid antigen	no change	EBV-VCA	4363398
JY cell line	Jijoye cell line	JY cell line	2548326

These look mostly good, although I think it would be better to add "virus" to "Epstein–Barr" wherever it is still missing. Moreover, although I can accept not hyphenating some of the terms where it would technically be appropriate, I have serious doubts about the suggested parsing of "Epstein–Barr virus-encoded small RNAs". I can't wrap my head around it. With "Epstein–Barr-virus-encoded small RNAs" at least it makes some sense to me. The complete lack of hyphens can suggest that multiple parsings may be possible, but if there is a hyphen, this suggests a specific parsing. "What are virus-encoded small RNAs?" --JorisvS (talk) 10:24, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Good suggestions. I proposed "Epstein-Barr nuclear antigens" without the "virus" to try and stay consistent with my logic of finding the earliest papers that match the official gene name "e.g. EBNA-1". There are literature precedents for adding "virus," from more recent papers: e.g. "Epstein-Barr Virus Nuclear Antigen 1 Does Not Cause Lymphoma in C57BL/6J Mice". This way of writing it is used with some frequency, so I think adding "virus" to the EBNA pages is a good idea. The EBNA IRES, however, has only one paper describing the name, and they write it "Epstein-Barr nuclear antigen." Here I'd prefer not adding "virus" because this would contradict the sole (and primary) paper describing this RNA. It's awkward to have it be the only page without "virus" but the alternative is to leave out the "virus" from the other EBNA pages... The hyphenation of "Epstein–Barr virus-encoded small RNAs" comes from the first paper reporting their discovery. I think the author was trying to stress that the small RNAs are encoded by the Epstein–Barr virus. This hyphenation is used in the majority of papers that I've seen; mainly, I think, because earlier in the paper they typically define "Epstein–Barr virus" as "EBV" so and later write "EBV-encoded small RNAs". Leaving the hyphen out to suggest multiple hyphenations might be OK, although I've only found one paper that uses no hyphenation: "Epstein Barr virus (EBV) encoded small RNAs: targets for detection by in situ hybridisation with oligonucleotide probes.". The majority seem to prefer the hyphenated form. Walternmoss (talk) 13:38, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Well, we'd be internally consistent and it would be logical to also add "virus" in that case. Naturally, we would add redirects from the pages without "virus", so that whatever a user enters in his search, he will find the page. --JorisvS (talk) 14:13, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. Good idea w/r to the redirects. Walternmoss (talk) 16:43, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Technically and logically, the hyphenation would thus have to be "Epstein–Barr-virus-encoded small RNAs". I'd prefer the title to be that, of course, and with redirects from the three pages without these hyphens. If we really can't agree on that, then I'd rather see "EBV-encoded small RNAs" than "Epstein–Barr virus-encoded small RNAs", because using the acronym at least suggests the proper logic. --JorisvS (talk) 14:13, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

As we're spelling out EBV in the other pages, maybe it's best to do so here as well. Agreed about the hyphenation logic, however I'm leaning towards the un-hyphenated form of the EBERs. There's at least some precedent for this form in the literature and it seems to skirt the issue of hyphens. Here redirects from "EBER", "EBER1", "EBER2", "EBV-encoded small RNAs", "Epstein–Barr encoded RNAs", and the variously hyphenated versions can be made too. Done this way, I think we're pretty close to having a consistent naming system for the EBV-related wikipages that also respects the source material. It is a little frustrating, as scientists are sort of laissez-faire about writing-out and punctuating the acronyms: probably because once it's done in the beginning of a paper the acronym gets used subsequently. Scray had the idea of only using the acronym for the main page to avoid this confusion. This is a good solution, but then anyone who's not really familiar with the subject might be lost. Things like ribonucleic acid (RNA) are so well-known that the acronym should be good to use; but EBERs, EBNAs, LMPs, IRESs, and EBV are not as well-known. Spelling them out does make the pages more accessible. Walternmoss (talk) 16:43, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

The lead paragraph of EBV-related articles can define (and link) "EBV"; redirects can help guide those who spell out the full name. This is not a new problem - using the acronym in the title will be fine. -- Scray (talk) 16:54, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

So then the sub-page names would read "EBV-encoded small RNAs", "EBV nuclear antigen 1", "EBV stable intronic sequence RNAs", etc.? This is an interesting option. Walternmoss (talk) 18:21, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

I prefer spelling things out. Only in the case that I've outlined I may go for using an acronym that is not widely known. I'm fine with using "RNA", etc.. Personally, I can more quickly get the logic of the term, and hence understand what the topic is about, if the 'opaque' acronyms are avoided if possible. --JorisvS (talk) 09:13, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

Also, I have started a talk section on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Hyphens instead of endashes to discuss chnages to the line that led to this much discussion here. I would welcome your input there. --JorisvS (talk) 10:24, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Will do. Walternmoss (talk) 13:38, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

• I'm neutral on whether all those subpages need to be spelled out in the page title, especially where it leads to clumsy hyphenation. If you don't know what EBV stands for, the article on, say, EBNA-2 isn't going to enlighten you very much. The one I definitely think should spell out the virus name is the vaccine, as that's one that people with minimal viral knowledge are likely to be reading. Espresso Addict (talk) 17:16, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
• I conducted a (very) informal survey. I asked my Facebook friends and posted to "Yahoo Answers" to see if the general public were more familiar with EBV or Epstein–Barr virus. Of the 9 respondents, 8 preferred Epstein–Barr virus and 1person was unfamiliar with both terms. I also asked about spelling out article names vs using something like, "EBV-encoded small RNAs" (which seemed like an OK compromise). Like JorvisS worried about above, all respondents disliked this form and found it confusing. Also, 4 preferred the spelled out and hyphenated version of EBERs, "Epstein–Barr virus-encoded small RNAs" (the other respondents had no comment). This is a super small sample size, however only one of my friends has bio training (she's a vet), and I posted the Yahoo question to the gossip and entertainment section...so I think they all avoid my biased perspective (being much more familiar with acronyms). JorvisS, would it be OK with you to use this form of EBERs in the page name, but in the intro add something like, "Epstein–Barr virus (EBV)-encoded small RNAs (EBERs)?" I think this would explain the weird hyphenation in the primary literature. If this is OK with you, does anyone else have any objections to the proposed names in the table above? Walternmoss (talk) 13:03, 20 November 2013 (UTC)