Viral Replication Complexes Are Targeted by LC3-Guided Interferon-Inducible GTPases.

All viruses with positive-sense RNA genomes replicate on membranous structures in the cytoplasm called replication complexes (RCs). RCs provide an advantageous microenvironment for viral replication, but it is unknown how the host immune system counteracts these structures. Here we show that interferon-gamma (IFNG) disrupts the RC of murine norovirus (MNV) via evolutionarily conserved autophagy proteins and the induction of IFN-inducible GTPases, which are known to destroy the membrane of vacuoles containing bacteria, protists, or fungi. The MNV RC was marked by the microtubule-associated-protein-1-light-chain-3 (LC3) conjugation system of autophagy and then targeted by immunity-related GTPases (IRGs) and guanylate-binding proteins (GBPs) upon their induction by IFNG. Further, the LC3 conjugation system and the IFN-inducible GTPases were necessary to inhibit MNV replication in mice and human cells. These data suggest that viral RCs can be marked and antagonized by a universal immune defense mechanism targeting diverse pathogens replicating in cytosolic membrane structures.

Diverse roles of assembly factors revealed by structures of late nuclear pre-60S ribosomes.

Ribosome biogenesis is a highly complex process in eukaryotes, involving temporally and spatially regulated ribosomal protein (r-protein) binding and ribosomal RNA remodelling events in the nucleolus, nucleoplasm and cytoplasm. Hundreds of assembly factors, organized into sequential functional groups, facilitate and guide the maturation process into productive assembly branches in and across different cellular compartments. However, the precise mechanisms by which these assembly factors function are largely unknown. Here we use cryo-electron microscopy to characterize the structures of yeast nucleoplasmic pre-60S particles affinity-purified using the epitope-tagged assembly factor Nog2. Our data pinpoint the locations and determine the structures of over 20 assembly factors, which are enriched in two areas: an arc region extending from the central protuberance to the polypeptide tunnel exit, and the domain including the internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) that separates 5.8S and 25S ribosomal RNAs. In particular, two regulatory GTPases, Nog2 and Nog1, act as hub proteins to interact with multiple, distant assembly factors and functional ribosomal RNA elements, manifesting their critical roles in structural remodelling checkpoints and nuclear export. Moreover, our snapshots of compositionally and structurally different pre-60S intermediates provide essential mechanistic details for three major remodelling events before nuclear export: rotation of the 5S ribonucleoprotein, construction of the active centre and ITS2 removal. The rich structural information in our structures provides a framework to dissect molecular roles of diverse assembly factors in eukaryotic ribosome assembly.