Rhabdo in Greek means 'rod-shaped'. The first description of rabies dates from the 23rd century BC in Mesopotamia. In Latin word “ rabere” means to rage (In sanskrit word Rabhas means to do violence). During early 1881, French chemist Louis Pasteur and his assistant, Emile Roux , begin their research on rabies and successfully vaccinated Joseph Meister who was bitten by a rabid dog . Rabies is a zoonotic viral disease most often transmitted after the bite of rabies infected animal. Large cases of the rabies are reported each year from different parts of the world. The members of the family Rhabdoviridae belong to order Mononegavirales and contain six genera. The Rhabdoviruses contain negative strand RNA genome ranging from 11 to 15 Kb in size. Those Rhabdoviruses that infect plants are rod shaped with rounded ends eg Potato yellow dwarf virus while those infecting animals are bullet shaped eg Rabies virus (Lyssa virus).

Rhabdoviridae is divided into six genera

1. Cytorhabdovirus 2. Nucleorhabdovirus

Plant viruses