Structure determination of coxsackievirus B3 to 3.5 Å resolution

The crystal structure of coxsackievirus B3 (CVB3) has been determined to 3.5 Å resolution. The icosahedral CVB3 particles crystallize in the monoclinic space group, P2₁, (a = 574.6, b = 302.1, c = 521.6 Å, β = 107.7°) with two virions in the asymmetric unit giving 120-fold non-crystallographic redundancy. The crystals diffracted to 2.7 Å resolution and the X-ray data set was 55% complete to 3.0,4, resolution. Systematically weak reflections and the self-rotation function established pseudo R32 symmetry with each particle sitting on a 32 special position. This constrained the orientation and position of each particle in the monoclinic cell to near face-centered positions and allowed for a total of six possible monoclinic space-group settings. Correct interpretation of the high-resolution (3.0–3.2 Å) self-rotation function was instrumental in determining the deviations from R32 orientations of the virus particles in the unit cell. Accurate particle orientations permitted the correct assignment of the crystal space-group setting amongst the six ambiguous possibilities and for the correct determination of particle positions. Real-space electron-density averaging and phase refinement, using human rhinovius 14 (HRV14) as an initial phasing model, have been carried out to 3.5 Å resolution. The initial structural model has been built and refined to 3.5 Å resolution using X-PLOR.