Dengue Fever: Causes, Complications, and Vaccine Strategies

Figure 2

Organization of E protein on dengue virus surface during its life cycle. The E protein is colored as follows: EDI (red), EDII (yellow), EDIII (blue), and the FL (green). prM and M protein are colored as cyan. (a) Immature virus contains 60 trimeric spikes of E and prM heterodimer. (b) Mature virus contains 90 homodimers of E protein. (c) These homodimers then further undergo reorganization to form fusion active E homotrimers in which fusion loop is exposed. M protein is not shown in the fusion trimer for simplicity. E, C, M, FL, and prM denote envelope, capsid, membrane, fusion loop, and precursor membrane, respectively.