Insights into bacteriophage T5 structure from analysis of its morphogenesis genes and protein components

Bacteriophage T5 represents a large family of lytic Siphoviridae infecting Gram-negative bacteria. The low-resolution structure of T5 showed the T=13 geometry of the capsid and the unusual trimeric organization of the tail tube, and the assembly pathway of the capsid was established. Although major structural proteins of T5 have been identified in these studies, most of the genes encoding the morphogenesis proteins remained to be identified. Here, we combine a proteomic analysis of T5 particles with a bioinformatic study and electron microscopic immunolocalization to assign function to the genes encoding the structural proteins, the packaging proteins, and other nonstructural components required for T5 assembly. A head maturation protease that likely accounts for the cleavage of the different capsid proteins is identified. Two other proteins involved in capsid maturation add originality to the T5 capsid assembly mechanism: the single head-to-tail joining protein, which closes the T5 capsid after DNA packaging, and the nicking endonuclease responsible for the single-strand interruptions in the T5 genome. We localize most of the tail proteins that were hitherto uncharacterized and provide a detailed description of the tail tip composition. Our findings highlight novel variations of viral assembly strategies and of virion particle architecture. They further recommend T5 for exploring phage structure and assembly and for deciphering conformational rearrangements that accompany DNA transfer from the capsid to the host cytoplasm.