Tomographic reconstruction of a virus factory.

<p>3T3 cells were infected with PyV as described for <a href="http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.ppat.1002630#ppat-1002630-g001" target="_blank">Figure 1</a>. <b>A</b>) 70 nm thin section of Epon-embedded cells showing tubular structures adjacent to a virus cluster. (Black arrowhead, “full” tubular structure; white arrowhead, full virion; black arrow, “empty” tubular structure; white arrow, empty virion) <b>B</b>) A cluster of virions packed in a highly ordered array at the periphery of a bundle of tubular structures. One of the tubular structures appears in the plane (black arrowhead). Empty (white arrow) and full (white arrowhead) virions are identified in the virus clusters. <b>C</b>) 3-D model of (B) showing ≈2000 full assembled virions (pink spheres) and ≈2% empty virions (red spheres) in a 300 nm thick section. The tubular structures are either filled with electron-dense material (yellow cylinders) or appear empty (red cylinders). (See also Supporting information <a href="http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.ppat.1002630#ppat.1002630.s003" target="_blank">Video S2</a>).