Unique Structure Of African Swine Fever Virus Enzyme May Allow Drug Development

A DNA-copying protein from a lethal pig virus has a unique structure that may offer a target for drugs designed to combat this important agricultural disease, according to a study publishing February 28th in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Yiqing Chen and colleagues at Fudan University in Shanghai, China.

African swine fever virus (ASFV) is a highly contagious and deadly disease in pigs that has spread from Africa to areas of Europe and Asia. Currently there are no treatments, and control relies on killing entire herds once infection is detected. Viral replication depends in part on a polymerase enzyme, AsfvPolX, that repairs breaks in the DNA, but the structure of this enzyme has not been determined in detail. Here, the authors used X-ray diffraction and nuclear magnetic resonance to solve the structure at atomic resolution.