A human antibody against Zika virus crosslinks the E protein to prevent infection.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 28300075.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/ncomms14722 and PMC identifier 5356071.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
The recent Zika virus (ZIKV) epidemic has been linked to unusual and severe clinical manifestations including microcephaly in fetuses of infected pregnant women and Guillian-Barré syndrome in adults. Neutralizing antibodies present a possible therapeutic approach to prevent and control ZIKV infection. Here we present a 6.2 Å resolution three-dimensional cryo-electron microscopy (cryoEM) structure of an infectious ZIKV (strain H/PF/2013, French Polynesia) in complex with the Fab fragment of a highly therapeutic and neutralizing human monoclonal antibody, ZIKV-117. The antibody had been shown to prevent fetal infection and demise in mice. The structure shows that ZIKV-117 Fabs cross-link the monomers within the surface E glycoprotein dimers as well as between neighbouring dimers, thus preventing the reorganization of E protein monomers into fusogenic trimers in the acidic environment of endosomes.
Medical subject headings
- Antibodies, Neutralizing
- Antibodies, Viral
- Viral Structural Proteins
- Zika Virus
- Zika Virus Infection