Dr. Asim Dasgupta's laboratory studies the molecular biology of small mammalian RNA viruses, called picornaviruses. These viruses include those inducing common cold (rhinoviruses), poliomyelitis, (poliovirus), infectious hepatitis (hepatitis A), encephalitis and juvenile diabetes (coxsackie viruses) and hepatitis C virus (a flavivirus). Dasgupta and his colleagues research: the mechanisms by which these viruses regulate host cell transcription by RNA polymerases I, II and III; how they replicate their RNA genome; and how viral translation is regulated in infected cells.