Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has spurred vigorous research in a field that is old but new, a
fusion of aerosol science and virology, each with its own history. I tentatively refer to this
interdisciplinary field as “aerosol virology”. This review article aims to convey the appeal of
research in this field to virologists unfamiliar with aerosol science, covering fundamental knowledge
of aerosols. In fact, preceding this article, I had published in the Japanese Journal of Aerosol Science
a companion review with this, titled “An Introduction to Aerosol Virology”1）, which included basic
virological knowledge for members less familiar with viruses, aiming to spark their interest in the
field.
To advance “aerosol virology”, it is necessary to approach research goals with knowledge
of both aerosol science and virology, not just one field. This represents a largely unexplored frontier
even for virology. I hope members of the Virology Society will venture into this frontier. Both
reviews were written with this aspiration in mind.
