简介：TheE(envelope)proteinisthesmalleststructuralproteininallcoronavirusesandistheonlyviralstructuralproteininwhichnovariationhasbeendetected.WeconductedgenomesequencingandphylogeneticanalysesofSARS-CoV.Basedongenomesequencing,wepredictedtheEproteinisatransmembrane(TM)pro-teincharacterizedbyaTMregionwithstronghydrophobicityandα-helixcon-formation.Weidentifiedasegment(NH2-_L-Cys-A-Y-Cys-Cys-N_-COOH)inthecarboxyl-terminalregionoftheEproteinthatappearstoformthreedisulfidebondswithanothersegmentofcorrespondingcysteinesinthecarboxyl-terminusoftheS(spike)protein.ThesebondspointtoapossiblestructuralassociationbetweentheEandSproteins.OurphylogeneticanalysesoftheEproteinsequencesinallpub-lishedcoronavirusesplaceSARS-CoVinanindependentgroupinCoronaviridaeandsuggestanon-humananimalorigin.

简介：WestudiedstructuralandimmunologicalpropertiesoftheSARS-CoVM(mem-brane)protein,basedoncomparativeanalysesofsequencefeatures,phylogeneticinvestigation,andexperimentalresults.TheMproteinispredictedtocontainatriple-spanningtransmembrane(TM)region,asingleN-glycosylationsitenearitsN-terminusthatisintheexteriorofthevirion,andalongC-terminalregionintheinterior.TheMproteinharborsahighersubstitutionrate(0.6%correlatedtoitssize)amongviralopenreadingframes(ORFs)frompublisheddata.ThefoursubstitutionsdetectedintheMprotein,whichcausenon-synonymouschanges,canbeclassifiedintothreetypes.OneofthemresultsinchangesofpI(isoelectricpoint)andcharge,affectingantigenicity.ThesecondchangeshydrophobicityoftheTMregion,andthethirdonerelatestohydrophilicityoftheinteriorstructure.PhylogenetictreebuildingbasedonthevariationsoftheMproteinappearstosupportthenon-humanoriginofSARS-CoV.Toinvestigateitsimmunogenicity,wesynthesizedeightoligopeptidescovering69.2%oftheentireORFandscreenedthembyusingELISA(enzyme-linkedimmunosorbentassay)withserafromSARSpatients.Theresultsconfirmedourpredictionsonantigenicsites.