Question

the empty protein shell of the phage is called​

Answer 1

Answer:

Formation of the Prohead. An empty shell, called the prohead or procapsid, is usually a required stable assembly intermediate which is then packaged with DNA. The difference in the structure of proheads and mature heads is discussed in Section 2.4.

Answer 2

Answer:

Bacteriophages have been a model system to study assembly processes for over half a century. Formation of infectious phage particles involves specific protein-protein and protein-nucleic acid interactions, as well as large conformational changes of assembly precursors. The sequence and molecular mechanisms of phage assembly have been elucidated by a variety of methods. Differences and similarities of assembly processes in several different groups of bacteriophages are discussed in this review. The general principles of phage assembly are applicable to many macromolecular complexes.