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Abstract
The immune response elicited by vaccines against microorganisms makes it the most successful medical interventions against infectious diseases. Conventional vaccines have limitations in inducing immunity against many types of pathogenic microorganism. The genetic diversity of microorganisms, coupled with the high degree of sequence variability in antigenic proteins, presents a challenge to developing broadly effective conventional vaccines. Atomic-resolution structure determination is crucial for understanding antigenic protein function. Cryo-electron microscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy coupled with bioinformatics provide three-dimensional structure of the antigenic proteins and provide a wealth of information about the organization of individual atoms and their chemical makeup. The atomic detail information of proteins offers enormous potential to rationally engineer proteins to enhance their properties and act as effective immunogens to induce immunity. The observation that whole protein antigens are not necessarily essential for inducing immunity has led to the emergence "structural vaccinology." Structure-based vaccines are designed on the rationale that protective epitopes should be sufficient to induce immune responses and provide protection against pathogens. In 2013 we published a review on structure-based vaccines (Thomas and Luxon. Expert Rev Vaccines 12 1301-11, 2013). This review states the progress in development of structure-based vaccines since the first review.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sunil Thomas
- Lankenau Institute for Medical Research, Wynnewood, PA, USA.
| | - Ann Abraham
- Lankenau Institute for Medical Research, Wynnewood, PA, USA
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Structural Insights into the Respiratory Syncytial Virus RNA Synthesis Complexes. Viruses 2021; 13:v13050834. [PMID: 34063087 PMCID: PMC8147935 DOI: 10.3390/v13050834] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/03/2021] [Revised: 04/30/2021] [Accepted: 05/02/2021] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
RNA synthesis in respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), a negative-sense (-) nonsegmented RNA virus, consists of viral gene transcription and genome replication. Gene transcription includes the positive-sense (+) viral mRNA synthesis, 5'-RNA capping and methylation, and 3' end polyadenylation. Genome replication includes (+) RNA antigenome and (-) RNA genome synthesis. RSV executes the viral RNA synthesis using an RNA synthesis ribonucleoprotein (RNP) complex, comprising four proteins, the nucleoprotein (N), the large protein (L), the phosphoprotein (P), and the M2-1 protein. We provide an overview of the RSV RNA synthesis and the structural insights into the RSV gene transcription and genome replication process. We propose a model of how the essential four proteins coordinate their activities in different RNA synthesis processes.
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Gao Y, Cao D, Pawnikar S, John KP, Ahn HM, Hill S, Ha JM, Parikh P, Ogilvie C, Swain A, Yang A, Bell A, Salazar A, Miao Y, Liang B. Structure of the Human Respiratory Syncytial Virus M2-1 Protein in Complex with a Short Positive-Sense Gene-End RNA. Structure 2020; 28:979-990.e4. [PMID: 32697936 DOI: 10.1016/j.str.2020.07.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/18/2020] [Revised: 06/19/2020] [Accepted: 07/01/2020] [Indexed: 12/25/2022]
Abstract
The M2-1 protein of human respiratory syncytial virus (HRSV) is a transcription anti-terminator that regulates the processivity of the HRSV RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRP). Here, we report a crystal structure of HRSV M2-1 bound to a short positive-sense gene-end RNA (SH7) at 2.7 Å resolution. We identified multiple critical residues of M2-1 involved in RNA interaction and examined their roles using mutagenesis and MicroScale Thermophoresis (MST) assay. We found that hydrophobic residue Phe23 is indispensable for M2-1 to recognize the base of RNA. We also captured spontaneous binding of RNA (SH7) to M2-1 in all-atom simulations using a robust Gaussian accelerated molecular dynamics (GaMD) method. Both experiments and simulations revealed that the interactions of RNA with two separate domains of M2-1, the zinc-binding domain (ZBD) and the core domain (CD), are independent of each other. Collectively, our results provided a structural basis for RNA recognition by HRSV M2-1.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yunrong Gao
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Dongdong Cao
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Shristi Pawnikar
- Center for Computational Biology and Department of Molecular Biosciences, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66047, USA
| | - Karen P John
- Center for Computational Biology and Department of Molecular Biosciences, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66047, USA
| | - Hyunjun Max Ahn
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Shaylan Hill
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Ju Mi Ha
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Priyal Parikh
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Claire Ogilvie
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Anshuman Swain
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Amy Yang
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Amber Bell
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Angela Salazar
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA
| | - Yinglong Miao
- Center for Computational Biology and Department of Molecular Biosciences, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS 66047, USA.
| | - Bo Liang
- Department of Biochemistry, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322 USA.
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