Accurate Measurement of the Effects of All Amino-Acid Mutations on Influenza Hemagglutinin

Deep generative models of genetic variation capture the effects of mutations

The functions of proteins and RNAs are defined by the collective interactions of many residues, and yet most statistical models of biological sequences consider sites nearly independently. Recent approaches have demonstrated benefits of including interactions to capture pairwise covariation, but leave higher-order dependencies out of reach. Here we show how it is possible to capture higher-order, context-dependent constraints in biological sequences via latent variable models with nonlinear dependencies. We found that DeepSequence ( https://github.com/debbiemarkslab/DeepSequence ), a probabilistic model for sequence families, predicted the effects of mutations across a variety of deep mutational scanning experiments substantially better than existing methods based on the same evolutionary data. The model, learned in an unsupervised manner solely on the basis of sequence information, is grounded with biologically motivated priors, reveals the latent organization of sequence families, and can be used to explore new parts of sequence space.

A Universal Influenza Virus Vaccine Candidate Tested in a Pig Vaccination-Infection Model in the Presence of Maternal Antibodies

The antigenically conserved hemagglutinin stalk region is a target for universal influenza virus vaccines since antibodies against it can provide broad protection against influenza viruses of different subtypes. We tested a universal influenza virus vaccination regimen based on sequential immunization with chimeric hemagglutinin (HA) containing viruses in a swine influenza virus pig model with maternal antibodies against pandemic H1N1. Vaccines were administered as live attenuated virus or inactivated influenza virus split vaccine (+/− Emulsigen adjuvant). As controls, we included groups that received trivalent inactivated influenza vaccine that contained pandemic H1N1 antigens, inactivated adjuvanted H1N2 vaccine (control group for vaccine associated enhanced respiratory disease in the pig model) or mock-vaccination. No induction of H1 head or stalk-specific antibody responses was observed upon vaccination, while responses against H3 and influenza B HA were elicited in the group vaccinated with the trivalent vaccine. Four weeks post vaccination, pigs were intratracheally challenged with pandemic H1N1 virus and euthanized 5 days after challenge. Despite the lack of detectable anti-stalk immunity, the chimeric hemagglutinin vaccine resulted in better clinical outcomes compared to control groups.

Sera from Individuals with Narrowly Focused Influenza Virus Antibodies Rapidly Select Viral Escape Mutations In Ovo

Influenza viruses use distinct antibody escape mechanisms depending on the overall complexity of the antibody response that is encountered. When grown in the presence of a hemagglutinin (HA) monoclonal antibody, influenza viruses typically acquire a single HA mutation that reduces the binding of that specific monoclonal antibody. In contrast, when confronted with mixtures of HA monoclonal antibodies or polyclonal sera that have antibodies that bind several HA epitopes, influenza viruses acquire mutations that increase HA binding to host cells. Recent data from our laboratory and others suggest that some humans possess antibodies that are narrowly focused on HA epitopes that were present in influenza virus strains that they were likely exposed to in childhood. Here, we completed a series of experiments to determine if humans with narrowly focused HA antibody responses are able to select for influenza virus antigenic escape variants in ovo We identified three human donors that possessed HA antibody responses that were heavily focused on a single HA antigenic site. Sera from all three of these donors selected single HA escape mutations during in ovo passage experiments, similar to what has been previously reported for single monoclonal antibodies. These single HA mutations directly reduced binding of serum antibodies used for selection. We propose that new antigenic variants of influenza viruses might originate in individuals who produce antibodies that are narrowly focused on HA epitopes that were present in viral strains that they encountered in childhood.IMPORTANCE Influenza vaccine strains must be updated frequently since circulating viral strains continuously change in antigenically important epitopes. Our previous studies have demonstrated that some individuals possess antibody responses that are narrowly focused on epitopes that were present in viral strains that they encountered during childhood. Here, we show that influenza viruses rapidly escape this type of polyclonal antibody response when grown in ovo by acquiring single mutations that directly prevent antibody binding. These studies improve our understanding of how influenza viruses evolve when confronted with narrowly focused polyclonal human antibodies.

Enhanced ER proteostasis and temperature differentially impact the mutational tolerance of influenza hemagglutinin

We systematically and quantitatively evaluate whether endoplasmic reticulum (ER) proteostasis factors impact the mutational tolerance of secretory pathway proteins. We focus on influenza hemaggluttinin (HA), a viral membrane protein that folds in the host’s ER via a complex pathway. By integrating chemical methods to modulate ER proteostasis with deep mutational scanning to assess mutational tolerance, we discover that upregulation of ER proteostasis factors broadly enhances HA mutational tolerance across diverse structural elements. Remarkably, this proteostasis network-enhanced mutational tolerance occurs at the same sites where mutational tolerance is most reduced by propagation at fever-like temperature. These findings have important implications for influenza evolution, because influenza immune escape is contingent on HA possessing sufficient mutational tolerance to evade antibodies while maintaining the capacity to fold and function. More broadly, this work provides the first experimental evidence that ER proteostasis mechanisms define the mutational tolerance and, therefore, the evolution of secretory pathway proteins.

Destabilized adaptive influenza variants critical for innate immune system escape are potentiated by host chaperones

The threat of viral pandemics demands a comprehensive understanding of evolution at the host-pathogen interface. Here, we show that the accessibility of adaptive mutations in influenza nucleoprotein at fever-like temperatures is mediated by host chaperones. Particularly noteworthy, we observe that the Pro283 nucleoprotein variant, which (1) is conserved across human influenza strains, (2) confers resistance to the Myxovirus resistance protein A (MxA) restriction factor, and (3) critically contributed to adaptation to humans in the 1918 pandemic influenza strain, is rendered unfit by heat shock factor 1 inhibition-mediated host chaperone depletion at febrile temperatures. This fitness loss is due to biophysical defects that chaperones are unavailable to address when heat shock factor 1 is inhibited. Thus, influenza subverts host chaperones to uncouple the biophysically deleterious consequences of viral protein variants from the benefits of immune escape. In summary, host proteostasis plays a central role in shaping influenza adaptation, with implications for the evolution of other viruses, for viral host switching, and for antiviral drug development.

Deep mutational scanning of hemagglutinin helps predict evolutionary fates of human H3N2 influenza variants

A key goal in the study of influenza virus evolution is to forecast which viral strains will persist and which ones will die out. Here we experimentally measure the effects of all amino acid mutations to the hemagglutinin protein from a human H3N2 influenza strain on viral growth in cell culture. We show that these measurements have utility for distinguishing among viral strains that do and do not succeed in nature. Overall, our work suggests that new high-throughput experimental approaches may be useful for understanding virus evolution in nature.

Human influenza virus rapidly accumulates mutations in its major surface protein hemagglutinin (HA). The evolutionary success of influenza virus lineages depends on how these mutations affect HA’s functionality and antigenicity. Here we experimentally measure the effects on viral growth in cell culture of all single amino acid mutations to the HA from a recent human H3N2 influenza virus strain. We show that mutations that are measured to be more favorable for viral growth are enriched in evolutionarily successful H3N2 viral lineages relative to mutations that are measured to be less favorable for viral growth. Therefore, despite the well-known caveats about cell-culture measurements of viral fitness, such measurements can still be informative for understanding evolution in nature. We also compare our measurements for H3 HA to similar data previously generated for a distantly related H1 HA and find substantial differences in which amino acids are preferred at many sites. For instance, the H3 HA has less disparity in mutational tolerance between the head and stalk domains than the H1 HA. Overall, our work suggests that experimental measurements of mutational effects can be leveraged to help understand the evolutionary fates of viral lineages in nature—but only when the measurements are made on a viral strain similar to the ones being studied in nature.

Mutation and Epistasis in Influenza Virus Evolution

Influenza remains a persistent public health challenge, because the rapid evolution of influenza viruses has led to marginal vaccine efficacy, antiviral resistance, and the annual emergence of novel strains. This evolvability is driven, in part, by the virus's capacity to generate diversity through mutation and reassortment. Because many new traits require multiple mutations and mutations are frequently combined by reassortment, epistatic interactions between mutations play an important role in influenza virus evolution. While mutation and epistasis are fundamental to the adaptability of influenza viruses, they also constrain the evolutionary process in important ways. Here, we review recent work on mutational effects and epistasis in influenza viruses.

Multiplexed assays of variant effects contribute to a growing genotype-phenotype atlas

Given the constantly improving cost and speed of genome sequencing, it is reasonable to expect that personal genomes will soon be known for many millions of humans. This stands in stark contrast with our limited ability to interpret the sequence variants which we find. Although it is, perhaps, easiest to interpret variants in coding regions, knowledge of functional impact is unknown for the vast majority of missense variants. While many computational approaches can predict the impact of coding variants, they are given a little weight in the current guidelines for interpreting clinical variants. Laboratory assays produce comparatively more trustworthy results, but until recently did not scale to the space of all possible mutations. The development of deep mutational scanning and other multiplexed assays of variant effect has now brought feasibility of this endeavour within view. Here, we review progress in this field over the last decade, break down the different approaches into their components, and compare methodological differences.

The Influenza B Virus Hemagglutinin Head Domain Is Less Tolerant to Transposon Mutagenesis than That of the Influenza A Virus

Influenza A and B viruses can continuously evade humoral immune responses by developing mutations in the globular head of the hemagglutinin (HA) that prevent antibody binding. However, the influenza B virus HA over time displays less antigenic variation despite being functionally and structurally similar to the influenza A virus HA. To determine if the influenza B virus HA is under constraints that limit its antigenic variation, we performed a transposon screen to compare the mutational tolerance of the currently circulating influenza A virus HAs (H1 and H3 subtypes) and influenza B virus HAs (B/Victoria87 and B/Yamagata88 antigenic lineages). A library of insertional mutants for each HA was generated and deep sequenced after passaging to determine where insertions were tolerated in replicating viruses. The head domains of both viruses tolerated transposon mutagenesis, but the influenza A virus head was more tolerant to insertions than the influenza B virus head domain. Furthermore, all five of the known antigenic sites of the influenza A virus HA were tolerant of 15 nucleotide insertions, while insertions were detected in only two of the four antigenic sites in the influenza B virus head domain. Our analysis demonstrated that the influenza B virus HA is inherently less tolerant of transposon-mediated insertions than the influenza A virus HA. The reduced insertional tolerance of the influenza B virus HA may reveal genetic restrictions resulting in a lower capacity for antigenic evolution.IMPORTANCE Influenza viruses cause seasonal epidemics and result in significant human morbidity and mortality. Influenza viruses persist in the human population through generating mutations in the hemagglutinin head domain that prevent antibody recognition. Despite the similar selective pressures on influenza A and B viruses, influenza A virus displays a higher rate and breadth of antigenic variability than influenza B virus. A transposon mutagenesis screen was used to examine if the reduced antigenic variability of influenza B virus was due to inherent differences in mutational tolerance. This study demonstrates that the influenza A virus head domain and the individual antigenic sites targeted by humoral responses are more tolerant to insertions than those of influenza B virus. This finding sheds light on the genetic factors controlling the antigenic evolution of influenza viruses.

Biosensor-based epitope mapping of antibodies targeting the hemagglutinin and neuraminidase of influenza A virus

Characterization of the epitopes on antigen recognized by monoclonal antibodies (mAb) is useful for the development of therapeutic antibodies, diagnostic tools, and vaccines. Epitope mapping also provides functional information for sequence-based repertoire analysis of antibody response to pathogen infection and/or vaccination. However, development of mapping strategies has lagged behind mAb discovery. We have developed a site-directed mutagenesis approach that can be used in conjunction with bio-layer interferometry (BLI) biosensors to map mAb epitopes. By generating a panel of single point mutants in the recombinant hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) proteins of influenza A viruses, we have characterized the epitopes of hundreds of mAbs targeting the H1 and H3 subtypes of HA and the N9 subtype of NA.

Evidence for the Selective Basis of Transition-to-Transversion Substitution Bias in Two RNA Viruses

The substitution rates of transitions are higher than expected by chance relative to those of transversions. Many have argued that selection disfavors transversions, as nonsynonymous transversions are less likely to conserve biochemical properties of the original amino acid. Only recently has it become feasible to directly test this selective hypothesis by comparing the fitness effects of a large number of transition and transversion mutations. For example, a recent study of six viruses and one beta-lactamase gene did not find evidence supporting the selective hypothesis. Here, we analyze the relative fitness effects of transition and transversion mutations from our recently published genome-wide study of mutational fitness effects in influenza virus. In contrast to prior work, we find that transversions are significantly more detrimental than transitions. Using what we believe to be an improved statistical framework, we also identify a similar trend in two HIV data sets. We further demonstrate a fitness difference in transition and transversion mutations using four deep mutational scanning data sets of influenza virus and HIV, which provided adequate statistical power. We find that three of the most commonly cited radical/conservative amino acid categories are predictive of fitness, supporting their utility in studies of positive selection and codon usage bias. We conclude that selection is a major contributor to the transition:transversion substitution bias in viruses and that this effect is only partially explained by the greater likelihood of transversion mutations to cause radical as opposed to conservative amino acid changes.

Influenza A Virus Cell Entry, Replication, Virion Assembly and Movement

Influenza viruses replicate within the nucleus of the host cell. This uncommon RNA virus trait provides influenza with the advantage of access to the nuclear machinery during replication. However, it also increases the complexity of the intracellular trafficking that is required for the viral components to establish a productive infection. The segmentation of the influenza genome makes these additional trafficking requirements especially challenging, as each viral RNA (vRNA) gene segment must navigate the network of cellular membrane barriers during the processes of entry and assembly. To accomplish this goal, influenza A viruses (IAVs) utilize a combination of viral and cellular mechanisms to coordinate the transport of their proteins and the eight vRNA gene segments in and out of the cell. The aim of this review is to present the current mechanistic understanding for how IAVs facilitate cell entry, replication, virion assembly, and intercellular movement, in an effort to highlight some of the unanswered questions regarding the coordination of the IAV infection process.

The influenza virus hemagglutinin head evolves faster than the stalk domain

The limited ability of current influenza virus vaccines to protect from antigenically drifted or shifted viruses creates a public health problem that has led to the need to develop effective, broadly protective vaccines. While current influenza virus vaccines mostly induce an immune response against the immunodominant and variable head domain of the hemagglutinin, the major surface glycoprotein of the virus, the hemagglutinin stalk domain has been identified to harbor neutralizing B-cell epitopes that are conserved among and even between influenza A virus subtypes. A complete understanding of the differences in evolution between the main target of current vaccines and this more conserved stalk region are missing. Here, we performed an evolutionary analysis of the stalk domains of the hemagglutinin of pre-pandemic seasonal H1N1, pandemic H1N1, seasonal H3N2, and influenza B viruses and show quantitatively for the first time that the stalk domain is evolving at a rate that is significantly slower than that of the head domain. Additionally, we found that the cross-reactive epitopes in the stalk domain targeted by broadly neutralizing monoclonal antibodies are evolving at an even slower rate compared to the full head and stalk regions of the protein. Finally, a fixed-effects likelihood selection analysis was performed for these virus groups in both the head and stalk domains. While several positive selection sites were found in the head domain, only a single site in the stalk domain of pre-pandemic seasonal H1 hemagglutinin was identified at amino acid position 468 (H1 numbering from methionine). This site is not located in or close to the epitopes of cross-reactive anti-stalk monoclonal antibodies. Furthermore, we found that changes in this site do not significantly impact virus binding or neutralization by human anti-stalk antibodies, suggesting that some positive selection in the stalk domain is independent of immune pressures. We conclude that, while the stalk domain does evolve over time, this evolution is slow and, historically, is not directed to aid in evading neutralizing antibody responses.

Genome-wide identification of interferon-sensitive mutations enables influenza vaccine design

In conventional attenuated viral vaccines, immunogenicity is often suboptimal. Here we present a systematic approach for vaccine development that eliminates interferon (IFN)-modulating functions genome-wide while maintaining virus replication fitness. We applied a quantitative high-throughput genomics system to influenza A virus that simultaneously measured the replication fitness and IFN sensitivity of mutations across the entire genome. By incorporating eight IFN-sensitive mutations, we generated a hyper-interferon-sensitive (HIS) virus as a vaccine candidate. HIS virus is highly attenuated in IFN-competent hosts but able to induce transient IFN responses, elicits robust humoral and cellular immune responses, and provides protection against homologous and heterologous viral challenges. Our approach, which attenuates the virus and promotes immune responses concurrently, is broadly applicable for vaccine development against other pathogens.

How single mutations affect viral escape from broad and narrow antibodies to H1 influenza hemagglutinin

Influenza virus can escape most antibodies with single mutations. However, rare antibodies broadly neutralize many viral strains. It is unclear how easily influenza virus might escape such antibodies if there was strong pressure to do so. Here, we map all single amino-acid mutations that increase resistance to broad antibodies to H1 hemagglutinin. Our approach not only identifies antigenic mutations but also quantifies their effect sizes. All antibodies select mutations, but the effect sizes vary widely. The virus can escape a broad antibody to hemagglutinin's receptor-binding site the same way it escapes narrow strain-specific antibodies: via single mutations with huge effects. In contrast, broad antibodies to hemagglutinin's stalk only select mutations with small effects. Therefore, among the antibodies we examine, breadth is an imperfect indicator of the potential for viral escape via single mutations. Antibodies targeting the H1 hemagglutinin stalk are quantifiably harder to escape than the other antibodies tested here.

Mapping mutational effects along the evolutionary landscape of HIV envelope

The immediate evolutionary space accessible to HIV is largely determined by how single amino acid mutations affect fitness. These mutational effects can shift as the virus evolves. However, the prevalence of such shifts in mutational effects remains unclear. Here, we quantify the effects on viral growth of all amino acid mutations to two HIV envelope (Env) proteins that differ at >100 residues. Most mutations similarly affect both Envs, but the amino acid preferences of a minority of sites have clearly shifted. These shifted sites usually prefer a specific amino acid in one Env, but tolerate many amino acids in the other. Surprisingly, shifts are only slightly enriched at sites that have substituted between the Envs—and many occur at residues that do not even contact substitutions. Therefore, long-range epistasis can unpredictably shift Env’s mutational tolerance during HIV evolution, although the amino acid preferences of most sites are conserved between moderately diverged viral strains.

The virus that causes AIDS, or HIV, has a protein called Env on its surface, which is essential for the virus to infect cells. Env can also be recognized by the immune system, which then targets the virus for destruction or blocks it from infecting cells. Unfortunately, Env evolves very quickly, which means that HIV can evade our defenses. However, there are limits to how much this protein can change, since it still needs to perform its essential role in helping viruses enter cells.

In the century since HIV first appeared in human populations, the virus has evolved considerably. There are now many HIV strains that infect people, and they bear Env proteins with substantially different sequences. However, it is not clear if these changes in sequence have resulted in Envs from distinct strains being able to tolerate different mutations.

To examine this question, Haddox et al. compared how the Envs from two strains of HIV react to modifications in their sequences. They created all possible individual mutations in the proteins, and the resulting collections of mutated viruses were then tested for their ability to infect cells in the laboratory.

Most mutations had similar effects in both Env proteins. This allowed Haddox et al. to identify portions of the protein that easily accommodate changes, and portions that must remain unchanged for viruses to remain infectious—at least in the laboratory. Some of these mutations are under different types of pressures when the virus faces the immune system, and those were identified using computational approaches.

However, some mutations were tolerated differently by the two Env proteins. Therefore, viral strains differ in how their Env proteins can evolve. The parts of Env that showed differences in mutational tolerance between the strains were not necessarily the parts that differ in sequence. This shows that changes in sequence in one part of the protein can modify how other portions evolve.

It remains to be determined whether changes in tolerance to mutations translate into differences in how the virus can escape immunity. This is an important question given that the rapid evolution of Env is a major obstacle to creating a vaccine for HIV.

Synonymous Mutations at the Beginning of the Influenza A Virus Hemagglutinin Gene Impact Experimental Fitness

The fitness effects of synonymous mutations can provide insights into biological and evolutionary mechanisms. We analyzed the experimental fitness effects of all single-nucleotide mutations, including synonymous substitutions, at the beginning of the influenza A virus hemagglutinin (HA) gene. Many synonymous substitutions were deleterious both in bulk competition and for individually isolated clones. Investigating protein and RNA levels of a subset of individually expressed HA variants revealed that multiple biochemical properties contribute to the observed experimental fitness effects. Our results indicate that a structural element in the HA segment viral RNA may influence fitness. Examination of naturally evolved sequences in human hosts indicates a preference for the unfolded state of this structural element compared to that found in swine hosts. Our overall results reveal that synonymous mutations may have greater fitness consequences than indicated by simple models of sequence conservation, and we discuss the implications of this finding for commonly used evolutionary tests and analyses.

Extreme heterogeneity of influenza virus infection in single cells

Viral infection can dramatically alter a cell's transcriptome. However, these changes have mostly been studied by bulk measurements on many cells. Here we use single-cell mRNA sequencing to examine the transcriptional consequences of influenza virus infection. We find extremely wide cell-to-cell variation in the productivity of viral transcription - viral transcripts comprise less than a percent of total mRNA in many infected cells, but a few cells derive over half their mRNA from virus. Some infected cells fail to express at least one viral gene, but this gene absence only partially explains variation in viral transcriptional load. Despite variation in viral load, the relative abundances of viral mRNAs are fairly consistent across infected cells. Activation of innate immune pathways is rare, but some cellular genes co-vary in abundance with the amount of viral mRNA. Overall, our results highlight the complexity of viral infection at the level of single cells.

Diversity of Functionally Permissive Sequences in the Receptor-Binding Site of Influenza Hemagglutinin

Influenza A virus hemagglutinin (HA) initiates viral entry by engaging host receptor sialylated glycans via its receptor-binding site (RBS). The amino acid sequence of the RBS naturally varies across avian and human influenza virus subtypes and is also evolvable. However, functional sequence diversity in the RBS has not been fully explored. Here, we performed a large-scale mutational analysis of the RBS of A/WSN/33 (H1N1) and A/Hong Kong/1/1968 (H3N2) HAs. Many replication-competent mutants not yet observed in nature were identified, including some that could escape from an RBS-targeted broadly neutralizing antibody. This functional sequence diversity is made possible by pervasive epistasis in the RBS 220-loop and can be buffered by avidity in viral receptor binding. Overall, our study reveals that the HA RBS can accommodate a much greater range of sequence diversity than previously thought, which has significant implications for the complex evolutionary interrelationships between receptor specificity and immune escape.

Predictive Modeling of Influenza Shows the Promise of Applied Evolutionary Biology

Seasonal influenza is controlled through vaccination campaigns. Evolution of influenza virus antigens means that vaccines must be updated to match novel strains, and vaccine effectiveness depends on the ability of scientists to predict nearly a year in advance which influenza variants will dominate in upcoming seasons. In this review, we highlight a promising new surveillance tool: predictive models. Based on data-sharing and close collaboration between the World Health Organization and academic scientists, these models use surveillance data to make quantitative predictions regarding influenza evolution. Predictive models demonstrate the potential of applied evolutionary biology to improve public health and disease control. We review the state of influenza predictive modeling and discuss next steps and recommendations to ensure that these models deliver upon their considerable biomedical promise.

Fitness landscape of the human immunodeficiency virus envelope protein that is targeted by antibodies

HIV is a highly mutable virus, and over 30 years after its discovery, a vaccine or cure is still not available. The isolation of broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) from HIV-infected patients has led to renewed hope for a prophylactic vaccine capable of combating the scourge of HIV. A major challenge is the design of immunogens and vaccination protocols that can elicit bnAbs that target regions of the virus's spike proteins where the likelihood of mutational escape is low due to the high fitness cost of mutations. Related challenges include the choice of combinations of bnAbs for therapy. An accurate representation of viral fitness as a function of its protein sequences (a fitness landscape), with explicit accounting of the effects of coupling between mutations, could help address these challenges. We describe a computational approach that has allowed us to infer a fitness landscape for gp160, the HIV polyprotein that comprises the viral spike that is targeted by antibodies. We validate the inferred landscape through comparisons with experimental fitness measurements, and various other metrics. We show that an effective antibody that prevents immune escape must selectively bind to high escape cost residues that are surrounded by those where mutations incur a low fitness cost, motivating future applications of our landscape for immunogen design.

Influenza A virus hemagglutinin glycosylation compensates for antibody escape fitness costs

Rapid antigenic evolution enables the persistence of seasonal influenza A and B viruses in human populations despite widespread herd immunity. Understanding viral mechanisms that enable antigenic evolution is critical for designing durable vaccines and therapeutics. Here, we utilize the primerID method of error-correcting viral population sequencing to reveal an unexpected role for hemagglutinin (HA) glycosylation in compensating for fitness defects resulting from escape from anti-HA neutralizing antibodies. Antibody-free propagation following antigenic escape rapidly selected viruses with mutations that modulated receptor binding avidity through the addition of N-linked glycans to the HA globular domain. These findings expand our understanding of the viral mechanisms that maintain fitness during antigenic evolution to include glycan addition, and highlight the immense power of high-definition virus population sequencing to reveal novel viral adaptive mechanisms.

Influenza

Influenza is an infectious respiratory disease that, in humans, is caused by influenza A and influenza B viruses. Typically characterized by annual seasonal epidemics, sporadic pandemic outbreaks involve influenza A virus strains of zoonotic origin. The WHO estimates that annual epidemics of influenza result in ~1 billion infections, 3–5 million cases of severe illness and 300,000–500,000 deaths. The severity of pandemic influenza depends on multiple factors, including the virulence of the pandemic virus strain and the level of pre-existing immunity. The most severe influenza pandemic, in 1918, resulted in >40 million deaths worldwide. Influenza vaccines are formulated every year to match the circulating strains, as they evolve antigenically owing to antigenic drift. Nevertheless, vaccine efficacy is not optimal and is dramatically low in the case of an antigenic mismatch between the vaccine and the circulating virus strain. Antiviral agents that target the influenza virus enzyme neuraminidase have been developed for prophylaxis and therapy. However, the use of these antivirals is still limited. Emerging approaches to combat influenza include the development of universal influenza virus vaccines that provide protection against antigenically distant influenza viruses, but these vaccines need to be tested in clinical trials to ascertain their effectiveness.

A framework for exhaustively mapping functional missense variants

Although we now routinely sequence human genomes, we can confidently identify only a fraction of the sequence variants that have a functional impact. Here, we developed a deep mutational scanning framework that produces exhaustive maps for human missense variants by combining random codon mutagenesis and multiplexed functional variation assays with computational imputation and refinement. We applied this framework to four proteins corresponding to six human genes: UBE2I (encoding SUMO E2 conjugase), SUMO1 (small ubiquitin‐like modifier), TPK1 (thiamin pyrophosphokinase), and CALM1/2/3 (three genes encoding the protein calmodulin). The resulting maps recapitulate known protein features and confidently identify pathogenic variation. Assays potentially amenable to deep mutational scanning are already available for 57% of human disease genes, suggesting that DMS could ultimately map functional variation for all human disease genes.

Conserved epitope on influenza-virus hemagglutinin head defined by a vaccine-induced antibody

Circulating influenza viruses evade neutralization in their human hosts by acquiring escape mutations at epitopes of prevalent antibodies. A goal for next-generation influenza vaccines is to reduce escape likelihood by selectively eliciting antibodies recognizing conserved surfaces on the viral hemagglutinin (HA). The receptor-binding site (RBS) on the HA "head" and a region near the fusion peptide on the HA "stem" are two such sites. We describe here a human antibody clonal lineage, designated CL6649, members of which bind a third conserved site ("lateral patch") on the side of the H1-subtype, HA head. A crystal structure of HA with bound Fab6649 shows the conserved antibody footprint. The site was invariant in isolates from 1977 (seasonal) to 2012 (pdm2009); antibodies in CL6649 recognize HAs from the entire period. In 2013, human H1 viruses acquired mutations in this epitope that were retained in subsequent seasons, prompting modification of the H1 vaccine component in 2017. The mutations inhibit Fab6649 binding. We infer from the rapid spread of these mutations in circulating H1 influenza viruses that the previously subdominant, conserved lateral patch had become immunodominant for individuals with B-cell memory imprinted by earlier H1 exposure. We suggest that introduction of the pdm2009 H1 virus, to which most of the broadly prevalent, neutralizing antibodies did not bind, conferred a selective advantage in the immune systems of infected hosts to recall of memory B cells that recognized the lateral patch, the principal exposed epitope that did not change when pdm2009 displaced previous seasonal H1 viruses.

Deep mutational scanning of S. pyogenes Cas9 reveals important functional domains

RNA-guided endonucleases (RGENs) have invigorated the field of site-specific nucleases. The success of Streptococcus pyogenes Cas9 (SpCas9) has led to the discovery of several other CRISPR-associated RGENs. As more RGENs become available, it will be necessary to refine their activity before they can be translated into the clinic. With this in mind, we sought to demonstrate how deep mutational scanning (DMS) could provide details about important functional regions in SpCas9 and speed engineering efforts. Consequently, we developed a nuclease screening platform which could distinguish active Cas9 mutants. We screened a library of 1.9 × 107 with over 8500 possible non-synonymous mutations and inferred the effects of each mutation using DMS. We demonstrate that the RuvC and HNH domains are the least tolerant regions to mutation. In contrast, the Rec2 and PI domains tolerate mutation better than other regions. The mutation information defined in this work provides a foundation for further SpCas9 engineering. Together, our results demonstrate how DMS can be a powerful tool to uncover features important to RGEN function. Application of this approach to emerging RGENs should enhance their engineering and optimization for therapeutic and other applications.

Universal influenza virus vaccines: what can we learn from the human immune response following exposure to H7 subtype viruses?

Several universal influenza virus vaccine candidates based on eliciting antibodies against the hemagglutinin stalk domain are in development. Typically, these vaccines induce responses that target group 1 or group 2 hemagglutinins with little to no cross-group reactivity and protection. Similarly, the majority of human anti-stalk monoclonal antibodies that have been isolated are directed against group 1 or group 2 hemagglutinins with very few that bind to hemagglutinins of both groups. Here we review what is known about the human humoral immune response to vaccination and infection with H7 subtype influenza viruses on a polyclonal and monoclonal level. It seems that unlike vaccination with H5 hemagglutinin, which induces antibody responses mostly restricted to the group 1 stalk domain, H7 exposure induces both group 2 and cross-group antibody responses. A better understanding of this phenomenon and the underlying mechanisms might help to develop future universal influenza virus vaccine candidates.

Natural and directed antigenic drift of the H1 influenza virus hemagglutinin stalk domain

The induction of antibodies specific for the influenza HA protein stalk domain is being pursued as a universal strategy against influenza virus infections. However, little work has been done looking at natural or induced antigenic variability in this domain and the effects on viral fitness. We analyzed human H1 HA head and stalk domain sequences and found substantial variability in both, although variability was highest in the head region. Furthermore, using human immune sera from pandemic A/California/04/2009 immune subjects and mAbs specific for the stalk domain, viruses were selected in vitro containing mutations in both domains that partially contributed to immune evasion. Recombinant viruses encoding amino acid changes in the HA stalk domain replicated well in vitro, and viruses incorporating two of the stalk mutations retained pathogenicity in vivo. These findings demonstrate that the HA protein stalk domain can undergo limited drift under immune pressure and the viruses can retain fitness and virulence in vivo, findings which are important to consider in the context of vaccination targeting this domain.

Population Diversity and Collective Interactions during Influenza Virus Infection

Influenza A virus (IAV) continues to pose an enormous and unpredictable global public health threat, largely due to the continual evolution of escape from preexisting immunity and the potential for zoonotic emergence. Understanding how the unique genetic makeup and structure of IAV populations influences their transmission and evolution is essential for developing more-effective vaccines, therapeutics, and surveillance capabilities. Owing to their mutation-prone replicase and unique genome organization, IAV populations exhibit enormous amounts of diversity both in terms of sequence and functional gene content. Here, I review what is currently known about the genetic and genomic diversity present within IAV populations and how this diversity may shape the replicative and evolutionary dynamics of these viruses.

phydms: software for phylogenetic analyses informed by deep mutational scanning

It has recently become possible to experimentally measure the effects of all amino-acid point mutations to proteins using deep mutational scanning. These experimental measurements can inform site-specific phylogenetic substitution models of gene evolution in nature. Here we describe software that efficiently performs analyses with such substitution models. This software, phydms, can be used to compare the results of deep mutational scanning experiments to the selection on genes in nature. Given a phylogenetic tree topology inferred with another program, phydms enables rigorous comparison of how well different experiments on the same gene capture actual natural selection. It also enables re-scaling of deep mutational scanning data to account for differences in the stringency of selection in the lab and nature. Finally, phydms can identify sites that are evolving differently in nature than expected from experiments in the lab. As data from deep mutational scanning experiments become increasingly widespread, phydms will facilitate quantitative comparison of the experimental results to the actual selection pressures shaping evolution in nature.

Transposon Mutagenesis of the Zika Virus Genome Highlights Regions Essential for RNA Replication and Restricted for Immune Evasion

The molecular constraints affecting Zika virus (ZIKV) evolution are not well understood. To investigate ZIKV genetic flexibility, we used transposon mutagenesis to add 15-nucleotide insertions throughout the ZIKV MR766 genome and subsequently deep sequenced the viable mutants. Few ZIKV insertion mutants replicated, which likely reflects a high degree of functional constraints on the genome. The NS1 gene exhibited distinct mutational tolerances at different stages of the screen. This result may define regions of the NS1 protein that are required for the different stages of the viral life cycle. The ZIKV structural genes showed the highest degree of insertional tolerance. Although the envelope (E) protein exhibited particular flexibility, the highly conserved envelope domain II (EDII) fusion loop of the E protein was intolerant of transposon insertions. The fusion loop is also a target of pan-flavivirus antibodies that are generated against other flaviviruses and neutralize a broad range of dengue virus and ZIKV isolates. The genetic restrictions identified within the epitopes in the EDII fusion loop likely explain the sequence and antigenic conservation of these regions in ZIKV and among multiple flaviviruses. Thus, our results provide insights into the genetic restrictions on ZIKV that may affect the evolution of this virus.IMPORTANCE Zika virus recently emerged as a significant human pathogen. Determining the genetic constraints on Zika virus is important for understanding the factors affecting viral evolution. We used a genome-wide transposon mutagenesis screen to identify where mutations were tolerated in replicating viruses. We found that the genetic regions involved in RNA replication were mostly intolerant of mutations. The genes coding for structural proteins were more permissive to mutations. Despite the flexibility observed in these regions, we found that epitopes bound by broadly reactive antibodies were genetically constrained. This finding may explain the genetic conservation of these epitopes among flaviviruses.

Comprehensive Mapping of HIV-1 Escape from a Broadly Neutralizing Antibody

Precisely defining how viral mutations affect HIV's sensitivity to antibodies is vital to develop and evaluate vaccines and antibody immunotherapeutics. Despite great effort, a full map of escape mutants has not been delineated for an anti-HIV antibody. We describe a massively parallel experimental approach to quantify how all single amino acid mutations to HIV Envelope (Env) affect neutralizing antibody sensitivity in the context of replication-competent virus. We apply this approach to PGT151, a broadly neutralizing antibody recognizing a combination of Env residues and glycans. We confirm sites previously defined by structural and functional studies and reveal additional sites of escape, such as positively charged mutations in the antibody-Env interface. Evaluating the effect of each amino acid at each site lends insight into biochemical mechanisms of escape throughout the epitope, highlighting roles for charge-charge repulsions. Thus, comprehensively mapping HIV antibody escape gives a quantitative, mutation-level view of Env evasion of neutralization.

Functional Segregation of Overlapping Genes in HIV

Overlapping genes pose an evolutionary dilemma as one DNA sequence evolves under the selection pressures of multiple proteins. Here, we perform systematic statistical and mutational analyses of the overlapping HIV-1 genes tat and rev and engineer exhaustive libraries of non-overlapped viruses to perform deep mutational scanning of each gene independently. We find a "segregated" organization in which overlapped sites encode functional residues of one gene or the other, but never both. Furthermore, this organization eliminates unfit genotypes, providing a fitness advantage to the population. Our comprehensive analysis reveals the extraordinary manner in which HIV minimizes the constraint of overlapping genes and repurposes that constraint to its own advantage. Thus, overlaps are not just consequences of evolutionary constraints, but rather can provide population fitness advantages.

Deep mutational scanning identifies sites in influenza nucleoprotein that affect viral inhibition by MxA

The innate-immune restriction factor MxA inhibits influenza replication by targeting the viral nucleoprotein (NP). Human influenza virus is more resistant than avian influenza virus to inhibition by human MxA, and prior work has compared human and avian viral strains to identify amino-acid differences in NP that affect sensitivity to MxA. However, this strategy is limited to identifying sites in NP where mutations that affect MxA sensitivity have fixed during the small number of documented zoonotic transmissions of influenza to humans. Here we use an unbiased deep mutational scanning approach to quantify how all single amino-acid mutations to NP affect MxA sensitivity in the context of replication-competent virus. We both identify new sites in NP where mutations affect MxA resistance and re-identify mutations known to have increased MxA resistance during historical adaptations of influenza to humans. Most of the sites where mutations have the greatest effect are almost completely conserved across all influenza A viruses, and the amino acids at these sites confer relatively high resistance to MxA. These sites cluster in regions of NP that appear to be important for its recognition by MxA. Overall, our work systematically identifies the sites in influenza nucleoprotein where mutations affect sensitivity to MxA. We also demonstrate a powerful new strategy for identifying regions of viral proteins that affect inhibition by host factors.

During viral infection, human cells express proteins that can restrict virus replication. However, in many cases it remains unclear what determines the sensitivity of a given viral strain to a particular restriction factor. Here we use a high-throughput approach to measure how all amino-acid mutations to the nucleoprotein of influenza virus affect restriction by the human protein MxA. We find several dozen sites where mutations substantially affect the sensitivity of influenza virus to MxA. While a few of these sites are known to have fixed mutations during past adaptations of influenza virus to humans, most of the sites are broadly conserved across all influenza strains and have never previously been described as affecting MxA resistance. Our results therefore show that the known historical evolution of influenza has only involved substitutions at a small fraction of the sites where mutations can in principle affect MxA resistance. We suggest that this is because many sites are already broadly fixed at amino acids that confer high resistance.

Strategies to induce broadly protective antibody responses to viral glycoproteins

INTRODUCTION

Currently, several universal/broadly protective influenza virus vaccine candidates are under development. Many of these vaccines are based on strategies to induce protective antibody responses against the surface glycoproteins of antigenically and genetically diverse influenza viruses. These strategies might also be applicable to surface glycoproteins of a broad range of other important viral pathogens. Areas covered: Common strategies include sequential vaccination with divergent antigens, multivalent approaches, vaccination with glycan-modified antigens, vaccination with minimal antigens and vaccination with antigens that have centralized/optimized sequences. Here we review these strategies and the underlying concepts. Furthermore, challenges, feasibility and applicability to other viral pathogens are discussed. Expert commentary: Several broadly protective/universal influenza virus vaccine strategies will be tested in humans in the coming years. If successful in terms of safety and immunological readouts, they will move forward into efficacy trials. In the meantime, successful vaccine strategies might also be applied to other antigenically diverse viruses of concern.

Complete mapping of viral escape from neutralizing antibodies

Identifying viral mutations that confer escape from antibodies is crucial for understanding the interplay between immunity and viral evolution. We describe a high-throughput approach to quantify the selection that monoclonal antibodies exert on all single amino-acid mutations to a viral protein. This approach, mutational antigenic profiling, involves creating all replication-competent protein variants of a virus, selecting with antibody, and using deep sequencing to identify enriched mutations. We use mutational antigenic profiling to comprehensively identify mutations that enable influenza virus to escape four monoclonal antibodies targeting hemagglutinin, and validate key findings with neutralization assays. We find remarkable mutation-level idiosyncrasy in antibody escape: for instance, at a single residue targeted by two antibodies, some mutations escape both antibodies while other mutations escape only one or the other. Because mutational antigenic profiling rapidly maps all mutations selected by an antibody, it is useful for elucidating immune specificities and interpreting the antigenic consequences of viral genetic variation.

Correlation of fitness landscapes from three orthologous TIM barrels originates from sequence and structure constraints

Sequence divergence of orthologous proteins enables adaptation to environmental stresses and promotes evolution of novel functions. Limits on evolution imposed by constraints on sequence and structure were explored using a model TIM barrel protein, indole-3-glycerol phosphate synthase (IGPS). Fitness effects of point mutations in three phylogenetically divergent IGPS proteins during adaptation to temperature stress were probed by auxotrophic complementation of yeast with prokaryotic, thermophilic IGPS. Analysis of beneficial mutations pointed to an unexpected, long-range allosteric pathway towards the active site of the protein. Significant correlations between the fitness landscapes of distant orthologues implicate both sequence and structure as primary forces in defining the TIM barrel fitness landscape and suggest that fitness landscapes can be translocated in sequence space. Exploration of fitness landscapes in the context of a protein fold provides a strategy for elucidating the sequence-structure-fitness relationships in other common motifs.

The TIM barrel fold is an evolutionarily conserved motif found in proteins with a variety of enzymatic functions. Here the authors explore the fitness landscape of the TIM barrel protein IGPS and uncover evolutionary constraints on both sequence and structure, accompanied by long range allosteric interactions.

Mutation effects predicted from sequence co-variation

Many high-throughput experimental technologies have been developed to assess the effects of large numbers of mutations (variation) on phenotypes. However, designing functional assays for these methods is challenging, and systematic testing of all combinations is impossible, so robust methods to predict the effects of genetic variation are needed. Most prediction methods exploit evolutionary sequence conservation but do not consider the interdependencies of residues or bases. We present EVmutation, an unsupervised statistical method for predicting the effects of mutations that explicitly captures residue dependencies between positions. We validate EVmutation by comparing its predictions with outcomes of high-throughput mutagenesis experiments and measurements of human disease mutations and show that it outperforms methods that do not account for epistasis. EVmutation can be used to assess the quantitative effects of mutations in genes of any organism. We provide pre-computed predictions for ∼7,000 human proteins at http://evmutation.org/.

Identification of positive selection in genes is greatly improved by using experimentally informed site-specific models

Background

Sites of positive selection are identified by comparing observed evolutionary patterns to those expected under a null model for evolution in the absence of such selection. For protein-coding genes, the most common null model is that nonsynonymous and synonymous mutations fix at equal rates; this unrealistic model has limited power to detect many interesting forms of selection.

Results

I describe a new approach that uses a null model based on experimental measurements of a gene’s site-specific amino-acid preferences generated by deep mutational scanning in the lab. This null model makes it possible to identify both diversifying selection for repeated amino-acid change and differential selection for mutations to amino acids that are unexpected given the measurements made in the lab. I show that this approach identifies sites of adaptive substitutions in four genes (lactamase, Gal4, influenza nucleoprotein, and influenza hemagglutinin) far better than a comparable method that simply compares the rates of nonsynonymous and synonymous substitutions.

Conclusions

As rapid increases in biological data enable increasingly nuanced descriptions of the constraints on individual protein sites, approaches like the one here can improve our ability to identify many interesting forms of selection in natural sequences.

Reviewers

This article was reviewed by Sebastian Maurer-Stroh, Olivier Tenaillon, and Tal Pupko. All three reviewers are members of the Biology Direct editorial board.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13062-016-0172-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Experimental Estimation of the Effects of All Amino-Acid Mutations to HIV's Envelope Protein on Viral Replication in Cell Culture

HIV is notorious for its capacity to evade immunity and anti-viral drugs through rapid sequence evolution. Knowledge of the functional effects of mutations to HIV is critical for understanding this evolution. HIV's most rapidly evolving protein is its envelope (Env). Here we use deep mutational scanning to experimentally estimate the effects of all amino-acid mutations to Env on viral replication in cell culture. Most mutations are under purifying selection in our experiments, although a few sites experience strong selection for mutations that enhance HIV's replication in cell culture. We compare our experimental measurements of each site's preference for each amino acid to the actual frequencies of these amino acids in naturally occurring HIV sequences. Our measured amino-acid preferences correlate with amino-acid frequencies in natural sequences for most sites. However, our measured preferences are less concordant with natural amino-acid frequencies at surface-exposed sites that are subject to pressures absent from our experiments such as antibody selection. Our data enable us to quantify the inherent mutational tolerance of each site in Env. We show that the epitopes of broadly neutralizing antibodies have a significantly reduced inherent capacity to tolerate mutations, rigorously validating a pervasive idea in the field. Overall, our results help disentangle the role of inherent functional constraints and external selection pressures in shaping Env's evolution.

Annotating Protein Functional Residues by Coupling High-Throughput Fitness Profile and Homologous-Structure Analysis

Identification and annotation of functional residues are fundamental questions in protein sequence analysis. Sequence and structure conservation provides valuable information to tackle these questions. It is, however, limited by the incomplete sampling of sequence space in natural evolution. Moreover, proteins often have multiple functions, with overlapping sequences that present challenges to accurate annotation of the exact functions of individual residues by conservation-based methods. Using the influenza A virus PB1 protein as an example, we developed a method to systematically identify and annotate functional residues. We used saturation mutagenesis and high-throughput sequencing to measure the replication capacity of single nucleotide mutations across the entire PB1 protein. After predicting protein stability upon mutations, we identified functional PB1 residues that are essential for viral replication. To further annotate the functional residues important to the canonical or noncanonical functions of viral RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (vRdRp), we performed a homologous-structure analysis with 16 different vRdRp structures. We achieved high sensitivity in annotating the known canonical polymerase functional residues. Moreover, we identified a cluster of noncanonical functional residues located in the loop region of the PB1 β-ribbon. We further demonstrated that these residues were important for PB1 protein nuclear import through the interaction with Ran-binding protein 5. In summary, we developed a systematic and sensitive method to identify and annotate functional residues that are not restrained by sequence conservation. Importantly, this method is generally applicable to other proteins about which homologous-structure information is available.

IMPORTANCE

To fully comprehend the diverse functions of a protein, it is essential to understand the functionality of individual residues. Current methods are highly dependent on evolutionary sequence conservation, which is usually limited by sampling size. Sequence conservation-based methods are further confounded by structural constraints and multifunctionality of proteins. Here we present a method that can systematically identify and annotate functional residues of a given protein. We used a high-throughput functional profiling platform to identify essential residues. Coupling it with homologous-structure comparison, we were able to annotate multiple functions of proteins. We demonstrated the method with the PB1 protein of influenza A virus and identified novel functional residues in addition to its canonical function as an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase. Not limited to virology, this method is generally applicable to other proteins that can be functionally selected and about which homologous-structure information is available.

The Mutational Robustness of Influenza A Virus

A virus’ mutational robustness is described in terms of the strength and distribution of the mutational fitness effects, or MFE. The distribution of MFE is central to many questions in evolutionary theory and is a key parameter in models of molecular evolution. Here we define the mutational fitness effects in influenza A virus by generating 128 viruses, each with a single nucleotide mutation. In contrast to mutational scanning approaches, this strategy allowed us to unambiguously assign fitness values to individual mutations. The presence of each desired mutation and the absence of additional mutations were verified by next generation sequencing of each stock. A mutation was considered lethal only after we failed to rescue virus in three independent transfections. We measured the fitness of each viable mutant relative to the wild type by quantitative RT-PCR following direct competition on A549 cells. We found that 31.6% of the mutations in the genome-wide dataset were lethal and that the lethal fraction did not differ appreciably between the HA- and NA-encoding segments and the rest of the genome. Of the viable mutants, the fitness mean and standard deviation were 0.80 and 0.22 in the genome-wide dataset and best modeled as a beta distribution. The fitness impact of mutation was marginally lower in the segments coding for HA and NA (0.88 ± 0.16) than in the other 6 segments (0.78 ± 0.24), and their respective beta distributions had slightly different shape parameters. The results for influenza A virus are remarkably similar to our own analysis of CirSeq-derived fitness values from poliovirus and previously published data from other small, single stranded DNA and RNA viruses. These data suggest that genome size, and not nucleic acid type or mode of replication, is the main determinant of viral mutational fitness effects.

Like other RNA viruses, influenza virus has a very high mutation rate. While high mutation rates may increase the rate at which influenza virus will adapt to a new host, acquire a new route of transmission, or escape from host immune surveillance, data from model systems suggest that most new viral mutations are either lethal or highly detrimental. Mutational robustness refers to the ability of a virus to tolerate, or buffer, these mutations. The mutational robustness of a virus will determine which mutations are maintained in a population and may have a greater impact on viral evolution than mutation rate. We defined the mutational robustness of influenza A virus by measuring the fitness of a large number of viruses, each with a single point mutation. We found that the overall robustness of influenza was similar to that of poliovirus and other viruses of similar size. Interestingly, mutations appeared to be more easily accommodated in hemagglutinin and neuraminidase than elsewhere in the genome. This work will inform models of influenza evolution at the global and molecular scale.