Using common spatial distributions of atoms to relate functionally divergent influenza virus N10 and N11 protein structures to functionally characterized neuraminidase structures, toxin cell entry domains, and non-influenza virus cell entry domains.

The ability to identify the functional correlates of structural and sequence variation in proteins is a critical capability. We related structures of influenza A N10 and N11 proteins that have no established function to structures of proteins with known function by identifying spatially conserved atoms. We identified atoms with common distributed spatial occupancy in PDB structures of N10 protein, N11 protein, an influenza A neuraminidase, an influenza B neuraminidase, and a bacterial neuraminidase.