Department of Life and Consumer Sciences, College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences, University of South Africa, Private Bag X6, Florida, Roodepoort 1710, South Africa.
Biochem J. 2020 Apr 30;477(8):1479-1482. doi: 10.1042/BCJ20200223.
Coronavirus are the causative agents in many globally concerning respiratory disease outbreaks such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) and coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19). It is therefore important that we improve our understanding of how the molecular components of the virus facilitate the viral life cycle. These details will allow for the design of effective interventions. Krichel and coauthors in their article in the Biochemical Journal provide molecular details of how the viral polyprotein (nsp7-10) produced from the positive single stranded RNA genome, is cleaved to form proteins that are part of the replication/transcription complex. The authors highlight the impact the polyprotein conformation has on the cleavage efficiency of the main protease (Mpro) and hence the order of release of non-structural proteins 7-10 (nsp7-10) of the SARS-CoV. Cleavage order is important in controlling viral processes and seems to have relevance in terms of the protein-protein complexes formed. The authors made use of mass spectrometry to advance our understanding of the mechanism by which coronaviruses control nsp 7, 8, 9 and 10 production in the virus life cycle.
冠状病毒是许多全球性呼吸道疾病爆发的病原体，如严重急性呼吸综合征（SARS）、中东呼吸综合征（MERS）和 2019 年冠状病毒病（COVID-19）。因此，了解病毒的分子成分如何促进病毒生命周期非常重要。这些细节将有助于设计有效的干预措施。Krichel 及其在《生物化学杂志》上的文章的作者提供了病毒多蛋白（nsp7-10）如何从正单链 RNA 基因组中产生，并被切割成复制/转录复合物的一部分蛋白的分子细节。作者强调了多蛋白构象对主蛋白酶（Mpro）切割效率的影响，因此 SARS-CoV 的非结构蛋白 7-10（nsp7-10）的释放顺序。切割顺序对于控制病毒过程很重要，似乎与形成的蛋白质-蛋白质复合物有关。作者利用质谱技术来深入了解冠状病毒控制病毒生命周期中 nsp7、8、9 和 10 产生的机制。
