Related papers: New force replica exchange method and protein fold…
Single-molecule force spectroscopy has opened a new field of research in molecular biophysics and biochemistry. Pulling experiments on individual proteins permit us to monitor conformational transitions with high temporal resolution and…
We study the conformations of polymer chains in a poor solvent, with and without bending rigidity, by means of a simple statistical mechanics model. This model can be exactly solved for chains of length up to N=55 using exact enumeration…
Single molecule force spectroscopy reveals unfolding of domains in titin upon stretching. We provide a theoretical framework for these experiments by computing the phase diagrams for force-induced unfolding of single domain proteins using…
Single molecule force spectroscopy provide details of the underlying energy surfaces of proteins which are essential to the understanding of their unfolding process. Recently, it has been observed experimentally that by pulling proteins in…
We investigate the interplay between post-translational folding and escape of two small single-domain proteins at the ribosomal exit tunnel by using Langevin dynamics with coarse-grained models. It is shown that at temperatures lower or…
Folding of Ubiquitin (Ub) is investigated at low and neutral pH at different temperatures using simulations of the coarse-grained Self-Organized-Polymer model with side chains. The calculated radius of gyration, showing dramatic variations…
We present a method to investigate the kinetics of protein folding on a long time-scale and the dynamics underlying the formation of secondary and tertiary structures during the entire reaction. The approach is based on the formal analogy…
We use a free energy functional theory to elucidate general properties of heterogeneously ordering, fast folding proteins, and we test our conclusions with lattice simulations. We find that both structural and energetic heterogeneity can…
The thermodynamics of proteins indicate that folding/unfolding takes place either through stable intermediates or through a two-state process without intermediates. The rather short folding times of the two-state process indicate that…
The recently proposed fluctuation relation in unfolding forces [Phys. Rev. E ${\bf 84}$, $060101$(R) $(2011)$] is re-examined taking into account the explicit time dependence of the force distribution. The stretching of a tethered Rouse…
We have developed a new simulation method to estimate the distance between the native state and the first transition state, and the distance between the intermediate state and the second transition state of a protein which mechanically…
We apply the Wako-Saito-Munoz-Eaton model to the study of Myotrophin, a small ankyrin repeat protein, whose folding equilibrium and kinetics have been recently characterized experimentally. The model, which is a native-centric with binary…
Various biological sensory systems exhibit a response to a relative change of the stimulus, often referred to as fold-change detection. In the last few years fold-change detecting mechanisms, based on transcriptional networks, have been…
Protein folding cooperativity is defined by the nature of the finite-size thermodynamic transition exhibited upon folding: two-state transitions show a free energy barrier between the folded and unfolded ensembles, while downhill folding is…
Small mechanical forces play important functional roles in many crucial cellular processes, including in the dynamical behavior of the cytoskeleton and in the regulation of osmotic pressure through membrane-bound proteins. Molecular…
Protein folding is a universal process, very fast and accurate, which works consistently (as it should be) in a wide range of physiological conditions. The present work is based on three premises, namely: ($i$) folding reaction is a process…
A statistical mechanical description of flexible and semi-flexible polymer chains in a poor solvent is developed in the constant force and constant distance ensembles. We predict the existence of many intermediate states at low temperatures…
A novel combination of discontinuous molecular dynamics and the Langevin equation, together with an intermediate-resolution model, are used to carry out long (several $\mu$s) simulation and study folding transition and transport of proteins…
The wrapping equilibria of one and two adsorbing cylinders are studied along a semi-flexible filament (polymer) due to the interplay between elastic rigidity and short-range adhesive energy between the cylinder and the filament. We show…
Protein-ligand interactions are crucial for a wide range of physiological processes. Many cellular functions result in these non-covalent `bonds' being mechanically strained, and this can be integral to proper cellular function. Broadly,…