The nucleotide addition cycle of nucleic acid polymerases includes two major events: the pre-chemistry active site closure leading to the addition of one nucleotide to the product chain; the post-chemistry translocation step moving the polymerase active site one position downstream on its template. In viral RNA-dependent RNA polymerases (RdRPs), structural and biochemical evidences suggest that...
Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) and Zika virus (ZIKV) are mosquito-borne viruses of the Flavivirus genus that cause viral encephalitis and congenital microcephaly, respectively, in humans, and thus present a risk to global public health. The envelope glycoprotein (E protein) of flaviviruses is a class II viral fusion protein that mediates host cell entry through a series of conformational cha...
Co-trimoxazole, a fixed-dose combination of sulfamethoxazole (SMX) and trimethoprim (TMP), has been used for the treatment of bacterial infections since the 1960s. Since it has long been assumed that the synergistic effects between SMX and TMP are the consequence of targeting 2 different enzymes of bacterial folate biosynthesis, 2 genes (pabB and nudB) involved in the folate biosynthesis of Esc...
West Nile virus (WNV), a mosquito-borne flavivirus, is an important neurotropic human pathogen. As a biosafety level-3 (BSL-3) agent, WNV is strictly to BSL-3 laboratories for experimentations, thus greatly hindering the development of vaccine and antiviral drug. Recently, the research group led by Prof. Bo Zhang in WIV, developed a novel pseudo-infectious WNV reporter virus expressing the Gaus...
