Skip to main content

Write a PREreview

Cryo-EM of a Divergent Herpesvirus Reveals Structural Conservation and Novelty Including a Portal-Vertex Tegument Protein with Multiple Macrodomain-like Folds

Posted
Server
bioRxiv
DOI
10.64898/2026.02.13.705735

Ictalurid herpesvirus 1 (channel catfish virus) is an evolutionarily distant relative of human herpesviruses, from which it is thought to have diverged >400M years ago. Using cryogenic electron microscopy (cryo-EM) combined with symmetry-breaking and particle subtraction approaches, we determined structures of both the immature capsid and virion of IcHV-1. Due to limited genome annotation, we used the machine learning-based tool ModelAngelo for de novo model building, enabling unambiguous protein identification even at marginal resolutions. Notably, the IcHV-1 virion was found to have a substantial and elaborate portal-vertex associated tegument (PVAT) complex. Overall, we determined the identities and structures of ten IcHV-1 proteins: the major capsid protein; the triplex proteins; two novel virion-associated inner tegument proteins; the portal protein; and a further four PVAT proteins. Our findings reveal a high degree of fold conservation in the core capsid proteins when compared with those of human herpesviruses, but also considerable structural novelty, including for the first time in a herpesvirus, identification of a protein that has four putative macrodomains.

You can write a PREreview of Cryo-EM of a Divergent Herpesvirus Reveals Structural Conservation and Novelty Including a Portal-Vertex Tegument Protein with Multiple Macrodomain-like Folds. A PREreview is a review of a preprint and can vary from a few sentences to a lengthy report, similar to a journal-organized peer-review report.

Before you start

We will ask you to log in with your ORCID iD. If you don’t have an iD, you can create one.

What is an ORCID iD?

An ORCID iD is a unique identifier that distinguishes you from everyone with the same or similar name.

Start now