title: A virus of hyperthermophilic archaea with a unique architecture among DNA viruses.
abstract: Viruses package their genetic material in diverse ways. Most known strategies include encapsulation of nucleic acids into spherical or filamentous virions with icosahedral or helical symmetry, respectively. Filamentous viruses with dsDNA genomes are currently associated exclusively with Archaea. Here, we describe a filamentous hyperthermophilic archaeal virus, Pyrobaculum filamentous virus 1 (PFV1), with a type of virion organization not previously observed in DNA viruses. The PFV1 virion, 400 ± 20 × 32 ± 3 nm, contains an envelope and an inner core consisting of two structural units: a rod-shaped helical nucleocapsid formed of two 14-kDa major virion proteins and a nucleocapsid-encompassing protein sheath composed of a single major virion protein of 18 kDa. The virion organization of PFV1 is superficially similar to that of negative-sense RNA viruses of the family Filoviridae, including Ebola virus and Marburg virus. The linear dsDNA of PFV1 carries 17,714 bp, including 60-bp-long terminal inverted repeats, and contains 39 predicted ORFs, most of which do not show similarities to sequences in public databases. PFV1 is a lytic virus that completely disrupts the host cell membrane at the end of the infection cycle.
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Institut Pasteur, 75015 Paris, France;
authors.forename: Elena Ilka
authors.initials: EI
authors.lastname: Rensen
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Institut Pasteur, 75015 Paris, France; Earth-Life Science Institute, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Tokyo 152-8550, Japan;
authors.forename: Tomohiro
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Mochizuki
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Institut Pasteur, 75015 Paris, France;
authors.forename: Emmanuelle
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Quemin
authors.affiliation: Department of Marine Organic Biogeochemistry, Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, 1790 AB Den Burg, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Stefan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Schouten
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Institut Pasteur, 75015 Paris, France; krupovic@pasteur.fr david.prangishvili@pasteur.fr.
authors.forename: Mart
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Krupovic
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, Institut Pasteur, 75015 Paris, France; krupovic@pasteur.fr david.prangishvili@pasteur.fr.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Prangishvili
mesh_terms: D001105:Archaea / Q000821:virology*; D004267:DNA Viruses / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics / Q000648:ultrastructure; D016679:Genome, Viral; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions; D046529:Microscopy, Electron, Transmission
keywords: filamentous viruses; hyperthermophilic archaea; virion organization