By Kat Procyk
Photography by Rayni Shiring, University of Pittsburgh
A pedestrian carries a to-go coffee cup outside Alan Magee Scaife Hall on the Pittsburgh campus.
Simple pleasures—a morning cup of coffee, a piece of chocolate after dinner, a glass of wine—are anything but trivial. They’re rooted in our culture, shape the global economy and anchor everyday life.
However, the plants that produce the commodities behind these beloved rituals, such as coffee beans, cocoa and grapes, face growing threats from viral pathogens that are poorly understood by researchers.
Unlike animal viruses, plant viruses have distinct biological features that make them more difficult to study and often more impactful. They are spread through a wide range of agents, including insects, nematodes, fungi, protists and human agricultural activities that transport infected materials across regions and continents. Because infections often go unnoticed, these viruses can spread silently, posing a growing and significant risk to global food security.
Once a plant is infected, there’s no cure. Coffee plants, for example, face the threat of coffee ringspot virus. Spread by tiny mites that are found almost everywhere, this virus can cause leaves and fruit to drop and reduce crop yields, disrupting production in vulnerable regions. Its spread is also fueled by global trade in ornamental plants that can carry the virus without obvious symptoms. Even small rises in temperature can worsen infections, which will be made worse by climate change.
In an essay published in the Annual Review of Virology on July 7, 2026, Terence S. Dermody, Distinguished Professor, Vira I. Heinz Professor and chair, Department of Pediatrics, and professor of microbiology and molecular genetics, School of Medicine, University of Pittsburgh, alongside Anna E. Whitfield, William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor of Entomology and Plant Pathology, North Carolina State University, and Julie K. Pfeiffer, B.B. Owen Distinguished Professor of Molecular Research, Nadine and Tom Craddick Distinguished Professor of Medical Science, and professor and chair of microbiology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, explained the measures needed to stop the spread of these viruses. Recommendations included investing in surveillance systems capable of detecting viral threats, advancing basic research to better understand plant–virus–vector interactions and identify targets for countermeasures and training the next generation of plant virologists—a community that has diminished even as the challenges it faces have grown.
The three also published a related essay in The Hill on May 28, suggesting that advances in genome editing, precision agriculture and other innovations provide hope.
“We should resist the temptation to view plant viruses as inevitable background noise in agriculture,” Dermody says. “The pleasures that draw us together, even in just casual conversation on a Saturday morning, are worth protecting through sustained scientific attention and collective resolve.”