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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Mar 28, 2026

Environmental Sampling of Photosynthetic Microbes and Their Viruses: From Field to Lab

Environmental Sampling of Photosynthetic Microbes and Their Viruses: From Field to Lab

Published on: July 3, 2025

Visualizing virus assembly intermediates inside marine cyanobacteria.

Wei Dai¹, Caroline Fu, Desislava Raytcheva

¹National Center for Macromolecular Imaging, Verna and Marrs Mclean Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas 77030, USA.

|October 11, 2013

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Researchers visualized cyanophage Syn5 assembly within its host, Synechococcus, using cryo-electron tomography. This revealed distinct viral assembly intermediates and a conserved morphogenetic pathway for these essential marine viruses.

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Simple and Robust in vivo and in vitro Approach for Studying Virus Assembly

Simple and Robust in vivo and in vitro Approach for Studying Virus Assembly

Published on: March 1, 2012

Area of Science:

Microbiology
Virology
Marine Biology

Background:

Cyanobacteria are crucial photosynthetic organisms, fixing a significant portion of Earth's carbon.
Cyanophages are viruses that infect cyanobacteria, playing key roles in marine ecosystems and gene transfer.

Purpose of the Study:

To visualize and understand the intricate maturation process of cyanophage Syn5 within its host cell.
To identify distinct assembly intermediates and the morphogenetic pathway of Syn5.

Main Methods:

Utilized Zernike phase contrast electron cryo-tomography (cryoET) for high-contrast imaging of cellular structures.
Analyzed infected Synechococcus cells at various infection stages to observe phage progeny development.

Main Results:

Identified subcellular components like thylakoid membranes, carboxysomes, and polyribosomes within infected cells.
Observed Syn5 procapsids releasing scaffolding proteins and expanding during genome packaging.
Detected mature Syn5 particles with tails, some featuring an additional horn structure.

Conclusions:

Described a detailed morphogenetic pathway for cyanophage Syn5 assembly.
Highlighted the conserved nature of this pathway, suggesting ancient origins predating viruses of complex organisms.