For the first time, scientists have produced a large-scale map showing in precise detail how the influenza A virus rewires the proteins inside an infected human cell to replicate itself, and the map reveals a hijacking strategy that no one had seen before. Researchers at EMBL Hamburg and collaborators at the Leibniz Research Institute for Molecular Pharmacology, Charité Berlin, and other institutions published their findings on July 20, 2026, in Nature Microbiology, describing how the flu virus commandeers the cell's internal machinery through two distinct strategies, including the dissolution of small nuclear structures called paraspeckles in a way that appears to serve the virus's reproductive needs.
The map is the most structurally detailed record ever made of how influenza A directly interacts with human proteins inside intact infected cells, providing a foundation that researchers say could support the design of new antiviral drugs and more effective vaccines.
