Figure 4.

Comparison of how well the individual viral particles imaged match various decoys representing possible PC configurations. (A) Ten decoys of nine PCs each were constructed by removing one PC from the final structure shown in Figure 3D. For each of the ten, the fraction of particles aligning better to that decoy than any other decoy is shown with a gray bar, while a dashed line indicates the null hypothesis of parity amongst all the decoys. The PCs alone of each decoy are displayed over the corresponding bar and are colored: orange and red for locally three-fold symmetric PCs in a tip-to-tail configuration, purple for the three PCs whose RNA entry channels point towards the red PCs, and blue for the PC whose RNA entry channel points toward an orange PC. (B) Four decoys were constructed representing all possible nondegenerate configurations (of ten PCs each) that, when symmetrized, give 2/3 occupancy at the six equatorial vertices. The expected frequency of these decoys under a random distribution of PCs among possible sites is shown in light gray, while the fraction of particles actually matching each decoy better than the other three is shown in dark gray. The PCs alone from each decoy are displayed under the corresponding bar and colored as in (A). Note that the leftmost decoy is equivalent to the structure shown in Figure 3D.