| Comments |
P.2 left column bottom paragraph: "Observations accumulating over the past 25 years have observed wide variation in VPR [virus-to-prokaryote ratio], yet there is an emergent census that a suitable first-approximation is that VPR is 10 (see Table I BNID 104962). This ratio also reflects a consensus that typical prokaryote abundances are approximately 10^6 per ml and typical virus abundances are approximately 10^7 per ml [primary sources 50, 57]. Yet, the use of a fixed ratio carries with it another assumption: that of linearity, i.e., if prokaryote abundance were to double, then viruses are expected to double as well. An alternative is that the relationship between virus and prokaryote abundance is better described in terms of a nonlinear relationship, e.g., a power-law." |