Funded for the year 2023
Collaboration between the groups IbIV and RIEDEL
By causing diseases like measles, rabies, acute infantile bronchiolitis, and Ebola virus disease, mononegaviruses are responsible for a considerable number of fatalities in the human population and can therefore be regarded as a constant threat. Understanding the molecular mechanisms used by viruses greatly facilitates the discovery, design, and development of new antiviral drugs and approaches to fight these pathogens. To transcribe and replicate their genome, mononegaviruses use a unique and sophisticated RNA synthesis machinery made of a ribonucleoprotein template, or nucleocapsid, and a viral polymerase complex. Although we have structural data on these two components, information on how they assemble to form functional transcription complexes is lacking. The objective of this project is to decipher the molecular architecture of the transcription complex of vesicular stomatitis virus, a prototype of mononegaviruses, using cryo electron tomography. This project benefits from the expertise of Louis-Marie Bloyet on the RNA synthesis machinery of mononegaviruses and the expertise of Christiane Riedel in cryo electron tomography and on the structure of nucleocapsids.
This collaboration will provide new insight into the molecular mechanisms used by mononegaviruses to transcribe their genome.