Influence of the pre-membrane and envelope proteins on structure, pathogenicity, and tropism of tick-borne encephalitis virus.

ABSTRACT: Tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV) is a neurotropic flavivirus that causes thousands of human infections annually. Viral tropism in the brain is determined by the presence of necessary receptors, entry factors, and the ability of the virus to overcome host defenses. The viral structural proteins, pre-membrane (prM), and envelope (E) play an important role in receptor binding, membrane fusion, particle maturation, and antibody neutralization. To understand how these proteins influence virus distribution and tropism in the brain, we generated a chimeric virus harboring the prM and ectodomain of E from TBEV in the background of the low-pathogenic Langat virus (LGTV). We solved the atomic structures of both the chimeric virus and LGTV to compare them to the known TBEV structure. We show that

SUBMITTER: Rosendal E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12456022 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature