Related papers: Protein mechanical unfolding: a model with binary …
An all-atom model of proteins is used to show that the same sequence of amino acids can have many alternative structures, that are very distant from, and that can be as stable as, the corresponding native structure. Such alternative…
Theoretical studies of protein folding on lattice models relie on the assumption that water close to amino-acids is always in thermal equilibrium all along the folding pathway. Within this framework, it has always been considered that…
Molecular dynamics simulations of folding in an off-lattice protein model reveal a nucleation scenario, in which a few well-defined contacts are formed with high probability in the transition state ensemble of conformations. Their…
Proteins fold using a two-state or multi-state kinetic mechanisms, but up to now there isn't a first-principle model to explain this different behaviour. We exploit the network properties of protein structures by introducing novel…
Mechanical unfolding of polyproteins by force spectroscopy provides valuable insight into their free energy landscapes. Most phenomenological models of the unfolding process are two-state and/or one dimensional, with the details of the…
The mechanical unfolding of an engineered protein composed of eight domains of Ig27 is investigated by using atomic force microscopy. Exploiting a fluctuation relation, the equilibrium free energy as a function of the molecule elongation is…
A phenomenological model hamiltonian to describe the folding of a protein with any given sequence is proposed. The protein is thought of as a collection of pieces of helices; as a consequence its configuration space increases with the…
The understanding, and even the description of protein folding is impeded by the complexity of the process. Much of this complexity can be described and understood by taking a statistical approach to the energetics of protein conformation,…
A theoretical framework is developed to study the dynamics of protein folding. The key insight is that the search for the native protein conformation is influenced by the rate r at which external parameters, such as temperature, chemical…
Neither of the two prevalent theories, namely thermodynamic stability and kinetic stability, provides a comprehensive understanding of protein folding. The thermodynamic theory is misleading because it assumes that free energy is the…
The simulation of a protein's folding process is often done via stochastic local search, which requires a procedure to apply structural changes onto a given conformation. Here, we introduce a constraint-based approach to enumerate lattice…
We carry out a theoretical study of the vibrational and relaxation properties of naturally-occurring proteins with the purpose of characterizing both the folding and equilibrium thermodynamics. By means of a suitable model we provide a full…
Mechanical stretching of secondary structures is studied through molecular dynamics simulations of a Go-like model. Force vs. displacement curves are studied as a function of the stiffness and velocity of the pulling device. The succession…
We study the mechanical unfolding of a simple model protein. The Langevin dynamics results are analyzed using Markov-model methods which allow to describe completely the configurational space of the system. Using transition path theory we…
Equilibrium and out-of-equilibrium transitions of an off-lattice protein model have been identified and studied. In particular, the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of the protein undergoing mechanical unfolding is investigated, and by using a…
The dynamics of a folded protein is studied in water and glycerol at a series of temperatures below and above their respective dynamical transition. The system is modeled in two distinct states whereby the protein is decoupled from the bulk…
Understanding the principles of protein folding is a cornerstone of computational biology, with implications for drug design, bioengineering, and the understanding of fundamental biological processes. Lattice protein folding models offer a…
Structural fluctuations in the thermal equilibrium of the kinesin motor domain are studied using a lattice protein model with Go interactions. By means of the multi-self-overlap ensemble (MSOE) Monte Carlo method and the principal component…
We investigate the work dissipated during the irreversible unfolding of single molecules by mechanical force, using the simplest model necessary to represent experimental data. The model consists of two levels (folded and unfolded states)…
The authors address the problem of downhill protein folding in the framework of a simple statistical mechanical model, which allows an exact solution for the equilibrium and a semianalytical treatment of the kinetics. Focusing on protein…