This mini review describes briefly a limited number of approaches involved in profiling serine hydrolases during viral infection and assigning catalytic functions to previously uncharacterized serine hydrolases. Visualization of the altered active serine hydrolase in situ during viral disease progression, trying to fully understand mechanisms of resistance and developing new antiviral therapeutics and viral diagnostics will make the ABPP application more worthwhile for the field of virology. www.frontiersin.org Murphy's law—if anything can go wrong, it will: Problems in phage electron microscopy The quality of bacteriophage electron microscopy appears to be on a downward course since the 1980s. This coincides with the introduction of digital electron microscopes and a general lowering of standards, possibly due to the disappearance of several world-class electron microscopists The most important problem seems to be poor contrast. Positive staining is frequently not recognized as an undesirable artifact. Phage parts, bacterial debris, and aberrant or damaged phage particles may be misdiagnosed as bacterial viruses. Digital electron microscopes often seem to be operated without magnification control because this is difficult and inconvenient. In summary, most phage electron microscopy problems may be attributed to human failure. Journals are a last-ditch defense and have a heavy responsibility in selecting competent reviewers and rejecting, or not, unsatisfactory articles. Legend has it that Murphy's law was formulated in 1949 by a Captain Edward A. Murphy, then at Edwards Air Force Base in California. 15 There are several variants, all meant to express a perverse outcome. Murphy's law certainly applies to bacteriophage electron microscopy.