About the Authors

Shee-Mei Lok

Contributed equally to this work with: Shee-Mei Lok, Joshua M. Costin

Affiliations Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, United States of America, Emerging Infectious Diseases, Duke–NUS, Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

Joshua M. Costin

Contributed equally to this work with: Shee-Mei Lok, Joshua M. Costin

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America

Yancey M. Hrobowski

Current address: Operations and Tactics Division, Center for Naval Analyses, Alexandria, Virginia, United States of America

Affiliations Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America, Department of Microbiology and Immunology and Graduate Program in Cellular and Molecular Biology, Tulane University Health Sciences Center, New Orleans, Louisiana, United States of America

Andrew R. Hoffmann

Affiliation Department of Biochemistry, Tulane University Health Sciences Center, New Orleans, Louisiana, United States of America

Dawne K. Rowe

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America

Petra Kukkaro

Affiliation Emerging Infectious Diseases, Duke–NUS, Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

Heather Holdaway

Current address: Cleveland Center for Membrane and Structural Biology, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, United States of America

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, United States of America

Paul Chipman

Current address: Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, United States of America

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, United States of America

Krystal A. Fontaine

Current address: Department of Microbiology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America

Michael R. Holbrook

Current address: NIAID Integrated Research Facility, Ft. Detrick, Frederick, Maryland, United States of America

Affiliation Department of Pathology, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, Texas, United States of America

Robert F. Garry

Affiliation Department of Microbiology and Immunology and Graduate Program in Cellular and Molecular Biology, Tulane University Health Sciences Center, New Orleans, Louisiana, United States of America

Victor Kostyuchenko

Affiliation Emerging Infectious Diseases, Duke–NUS, Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

William C. Wimley

Affiliation Department of Biochemistry, Tulane University Health Sciences Center, New Orleans, Louisiana, United States of America

Sharon Isern

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America

Michael G. Rossmann

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, United States of America

Scott F. Michael

smichael@fgcu.edu

Affiliation Department of Biological Sciences, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, United States of America

Competing Interests

Tulane University has applied for patents covering the peptide described in this work with RFG and SFM as inventors (7,416,733 issued 8/26/2008, 7,854,937 issued 12/21/2010, application 20110130328 filed 8/22/2008). This does not alter the authors’ adherence to all the PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: JMC SML WCW MGR SI RFG SFM. Performed the experiments: SML VK MGR HH PC PK JMC YMH MRH DKR KAF SI ARH. Analyzed the data: JMC SML WCW MGR SI RFG SFM. Wrote the paper: SML JMC WCW MGR SFM.