Helical assemblies such as filamentous viruses, flagella, and F-actin represent an important category of structures in biology. As the first discovered virus, tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) was at the ...Helical assemblies such as filamentous viruses, flagella, and F-actin represent an important category of structures in biology. As the first discovered virus, tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) was at the center of virus research. Previously, the structure of TMV was solved at atomic detail by X-ray fiber diffraction but only for its dormant or high-calcium-concentration state, not its low-calcium-concentration state, which is relevant to viral assembly and disassembly inside host cells. Here we report a helical reconstruction of TMV in its calcium-free, metastable assembling state at 3.3 Å resolution by cryo electron microscopy, revealing both protein side chains and RNA bases. An atomic model was built de novo showing marked differences from the high-calcium, dormant-state structure. Although it could be argued that there might be inaccuracies in the latter structure derived from X-ray fiber diffraction, these differences can be interpreted as conformational changes effected by calcium-driven switches, a common regulatory mechanism in plant viruses. Our comparisons of the structures of the low- and high-calcium states indicate that hydrogen bonds formed by Asp116 and Arg92 in the place of the calcium ion of the dormant (high-calcium) state might trigger allosteric changes in the RNA base-binding pockets of the coat protein. In turn, the coat protein-RNA interactions in our structure favor an adenine-X-guanine (A*G) motif over the G*A motif of the dormant state, thus offering an explanation underlying viral assembly initiation by an AAG motif.
In the structure databanks used in Yorodumi, some data are registered as the other names, "COVID-19 virus" and "2019-nCoV". Here are the details of the virus and the list of structure data.
Jan 31, 2019. EMDB accession codes are about to change! (news from PDBe EMDB page)
EMDB accession codes are about to change! (news from PDBe EMDB page)
The allocation of 4 digits for EMDB accession codes will soon come to an end. Whilst these codes will remain in use, new EMDB accession codes will include an additional digit and will expand incrementally as the available range of codes is exhausted. The current 4-digit format prefixed with “EMD-” (i.e. EMD-XXXX) will advance to a 5-digit format (i.e. EMD-XXXXX), and so on. It is currently estimated that the 4-digit codes will be depleted around Spring 2019, at which point the 5-digit format will come into force.
The EM Navigator/Yorodumi systems omit the EMD- prefix.
Related info.:Q: What is EMD? / ID/Accession-code notation in Yorodumi/EM Navigator