A new member of OA at Springer has recently published its first journal article.

Molecular Biomedicine is a peer-reviewed, online open access, multidisciplinary journal that publishes the pioneer works of biomedicine and strives to become a high-quality SCI academic journal with international influence in the field of biomedical science. We emphasize on pathogenic mechanism and innovative techniques for diagnosis and therapy, offering the latest advances in basic, translational and clinical research to meet the needs of academic readers in this field.

Since its opening in June 2020, the journal has received more than 20 articles from multiple countries. After months of work by authors, editors, and reviewers, the first article titled “Structural characterization of the C-terminal domain of SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein” was finally published, concerning the C-terminal domain of SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein.

The newly emerging severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has resulted in a global human health crisis. The CoV nucleocapsid (N) protein plays essential roles both in the viral genomic RNA packaging and the regulation of host cellular machinery. Here, to contribute to the structural information of the N protein, the authors described the 2.0 Å crystal structure of the SARS-CoV-2 N protein C-terminal domain (N-CTD). The structure indicates an extensive interaction dimer in a domain-swapped manner. The interface of this dimer was first thoroughly illustrated.

Also, the SARS-CoV-2 N-CTD dimerization form was verified in solution using size-exclusion chromatography. Based on the structural comparison of the N-CTDs from alpha-, beta-, and gamma-CoVs, the authors demonstrate the common and specific characteristics of the SARS-CoV-2 N-CTD. Furthermore, evidence that the SARS-CoV-2 N-CTD possesses the binding ability to single-stranded RNA, single-stranded DNA as well as double-stranded DNA in vitro was also provided. In conclusion, this study could potentially accelerate research to understand the complete biological functions of the new CoV N protein.

Fig. 1 Overall Structure of the SARS-CoV-2 N-CTD

Article Access: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s43556-020-00001-4

Editors-in-Chief oF MOLECULAR BIOMEDICINE 

Arnold JM Driessen, 

professor at the University of Groningen, former director of Groningen Biomolecular Sciences and Biotechnology Institute, and one of the founders of the Center for Synthetic Biology and the Center for Sustainable Antibacterial (CESAM) both in Groningen. A member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. Chairman of the Dutch Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Member of consortium assembly of Building a Synthetic Cell (BaSyc). He has received awards including the Kluyver Award of KNVM and the FEBS Anniversary Prize of the Society for Biological Chemistry. He also serves as managing editor of Extremophiles, and chaired several conferences of the European Science Foundation, European Molecular Biology Organization, and Gordon Research Conference. He has authored more than 460 research papers, authored and edited two books, and (co-)invented 11 patents. Prof. Driessen is an outstanding scientist whose papers are highly cited (over 32,000 times) with an academic h-index of 97.

Yu-quan Wei, 

Ph.D., Professor and Director of National/State Key Laboratory of Biotherapy and Clinical Cancer Center, West China Hospital, West China Medical School, Sichuan University, Chengdu, academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences.. His major research interests include targeted therapy, signal transduction, gene and cell therapy, and cancer vaccines. He has published more than 300 papers in international journals including Nature, Nat Med, Nat Commun, PNAS, Blood, Cancer Res, Clinic Cancer Res, J Immunol, and J Biol Chem, etc. He is now President of China Medicinal Biotech Association. He has served as the cheif editor of Signal Transduction and Targeted Therapy, an associate editor of Human Gene Therapy and Editorial Board Member of several International Journals.

Website for Molecular Biomedicine: https://www.springer.com/journal/43556

Looking forward to your contributions.