The team of Prof. Alain Vanderplasschen, virologist and immunologist at the University of Liège, has published an article in the journal Nucleic Acids Research, reporting ten years of research on how a carp virus has been using a protein domain called Zalpha (Zα) to inhibit the defence mechanisms of the host cell. Importantly, this discovery has consequences on our understanding of the functions of important Zα domain containing proteins of the immune system.