Severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome virus (SFTSV) and Rift Valley fever virus (RVFV) are two arthropod-borne phleboviruses in the <i>Bunyaviridae </i> family, which cause severe illness in humans and animals. Glycoprotein N (Gn) is one of th ...
Severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome virus (SFTSV) and Rift Valley fever virus (RVFV) are two arthropod-borne phleboviruses in the Bunyaviridae family, which cause severe illness in humans and animals. Glycoprotein N (Gn) is one of the envelope proteins on the virus surface and is a major antigenic component. Despite its importance for virus entry and fusion, the molecular features of the phleboviruse Gn were unknown. Here, we present the crystal structures of the Gn head domain from both SFTSV and RVFV, which display a similar compact triangular shape overall, while the three subdomains (domains I, II, and III) making up the Gn head display different arrangements. Ten cysteines in the Gn stem region are conserved among phleboviruses, four of which are responsible for Gn dimerization, as revealed in this study, and they are highly conserved for all members in Bunyaviridae Therefore, we propose an anchoring mode on the viral surface. The complex structure of the SFTSV Gn head and human neutralizing antibody MAb 4-5 reveals that helices α6 in subdomain III is the key component for neutralization. Importantly, the structure indicates that domain III is an ideal region recognized by specific neutralizing antibodies, while domain II is probably recognized by broadly neutralizing antibodies. Collectively, Gn is a desirable vaccine target, and our data provide a molecular basis for the rational design of vaccines against the diseases caused by phleboviruses and a model for bunyavirus Gn embedding on the viral surface.
Organizational Affiliation:
National Center for Protein Science Shanghai, Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201210, China.,Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; gaofeng@genetics.ac.cn gaof@im.ac.cn.,Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Pathogen and Immunity, Shenzhen Third People's Hospital, Shenzhen 518112, China.,Research Network of Immunity and Health (RNIH), Beijing Institutes of Life Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China.,Department of Microbiology and Immunology, College of Biological Sciences, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100193, China.,Chinese Academy of Sciences Key Laboratory of Pathogenic Microbiology and Immunology, Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China.,National Institute for Viral Disease Control and Prevention, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing 102206, China.,Institute of Pathogenic Microbiology, Jiangsu Provincial Center for Disease Prevention and Control, Key Laboratory of Enteric Pathogenic Microbiology, Ministry Health, Nanjing 210009, China.,National Institute of Biological Sciences, Beijing 102206, China.,State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology, Beijing 100193, China.,Center for Influenza Research and Early-Warning, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China.,Chinese Academy of Sciences Key Laboratory of Pathogenic Microbiology and Immunology, Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; gaofeng@genetics.ac.cn gaof@im.ac.cn.
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