April 2, 1982
Dear Natalie:
I have received a message from Fred Murphy and David Kingsbury, suggesting that we should consider reviewing the retrovirus subfamilies "with the aim of defining and naming genera".  From my reading of the enclosed document (the statement on retroviruses filed with the ICTV), there is probably little that needs to be done other than consider making the status of Type D viruses permanent and adding more viruses within the subclasses.  Do you think more should be done?  It is my perception that new isolates are readily classified according to existing guidelines, and that the field does not really present any significant problems in nomenclature.  Does your recent excursion into taxonomy confirm this impression?
Things seem to be sufficiently well on schedule now for our book (at least a few copies of it) to be on the stands at the Cold Spring Harbor meeting.  The Appendix is done (I will be proofing it this weekend), and the index will be done next week.  I think Chapter 8 has turned out fairly well in the end, though the first version of the FeLV section was a literary disaster.  I only with the book weren't so long (and expensive).
Best wishes,
Harold E. Varmus, M.D.
Professor