Membrane Assembly during the Infection Cycle of the Giant Mimivirus
Figure 5
Assembly of icosahedral capsids on top of membrane sheets.
A, B. 10 nm digital slices 40 nm apart derived from 320 nm STEM tomogram of 8-hour PI VFs, revealing formation of angular structures by a layer lying on top of open membrane sheets (arrow) that are surrounded by vesicles (arrowheads). C, D. Two angles of 3-dimensional surface rendering presentations derived from panels A and B, showing an early assembling capsid. Membrane sheets and vesicles (arrowheads) are depicted in blue and newly generated angular structures are indicated in yellow (arrows). E, F. Two 10 nm digital slices from a later assembly stage, revealing the progression of angular structures (arrows) into truncated icosahedral morphologies and open membrane sheets still connected to vesicles (arrowheads). G, H. Two different angles of 3-dimensional surface rendering presentations of an assembling icosahedral capsid (yellow; arrows) on top of a membrane layer (blue; arrowheads). The corresponding movies are S10 and S11 for A–D, and Movie S12 for E–H. Scale bars: 100 nm.