Multi-modal cryo-EM reveals trimers of protein A10 to form the palisade layer in poxvirus cores

Abstract

Poxviruses are among the largest double-stranded DNA viruses with members such as Variola virus, Monkeypox virus and the famous vaccination strain Vaccinia virus (VACV). Knowledge about the structural proteins that form the viral core, found in all infectious poxvirus forms, has remained sparse. While major core proteins have been annotated via indirect experimental evidence, their structures have remained elusive and they could not be assigned to the individual architectural features of the core. Hence, which proteins constitute which layers of the core, such as the so-called palisade layer and the inner core wall has remained enigmatic. Here, we have performed a multi-modal cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) approach to elucidate the structural determinants of the VACV core. In combination with molecular modeling using AlphaFold, we unambiguously identify trimers formed by the cleavage product of A10 as the key component of the palisade layer. This allows us to place previously-obtained descriptions of protein interactions within the core wall into perspective and to provide a substantially revised model of poxvirus core architecture. Importantly, we show that interactions within A10 trimers are likely identical among Poxviridae, implying that our structural observations should be generalizable over most, if not all members of this important virus family. One sentence summarySingle-particle cryo-EM, cryo-electron tomography, and AlphaFold modeling reveal the structural architecture of the poxvirus core and identify trimers of protein A10 as the key component of the palisade layer.