A new kind of virus has been found by researchers. The virus was so big that it initially led the researchers to think that it was something else, but not a virus.

The discovery dispelled the beliefs about the nature of viruses. It was a long-held assumption that viruses are always small. Scientists named it Pandoravirus as they thought it fits the name the most.

Dr. Jean-Michel Claverie is a co-author of the paper. He told the New York Times, "We believe we're opening a Pandora's box - not so much for humanity but for dogma about viruses. We believe we're touching an alternative tree of life".

The study was published in the journal Science. The researchers reported in the study that because of its uniqueness, the Pandoravirus deserves its own classification.

The virus is double the size of the world's second largest known virus. It will not be wrong to call most of the viruses dwarf in comparison to the Pandoravirus. The volume of the Pandoravirus is 1,000 times of the common flu.

Out of its 2,556 genes, only seven percent match genes have already been identified by the science. According to researchers, the virus came out of a completely separate gene lineage from its peers.