Related papers: The Effect of Macromolecular Crowding, Ionic Stren…
We perform molecular dynamics simulations for a simple coarse-grained model of crambin placed inside of a softly repulsive sphere of radius R. The confinement makes folding at the optimal temperature slower and affects the folding…
Biochemical reactions inside living cells often occur in the presence of crowders -- molecules that do not participate in the reactions but influence the reaction rates through excluded volume effects. However the standard approach to…
A statistical mechanical theory is presented to predict the effects of macromolecular crowding on protein association equilibria, accounting for both excluded volume and attractive interactions between proteins and crowding molecules.…
In intracellular transports, motor proteins transport macromolecules as cargos to desired locations by moving on biopolymers such as microtubules. Recent experiments suggest that cargos that can associate motor proteins during their…
We introduce an approach for performing "very long" computer simulations of the dynamics of simplified, folded proteins. Using an alpha-carbon protein model and a fine grid to mimic continuum computations at increased speed, we perform…
We study the dynamics of intracellular calcium oscillations in the presence of proteins that bind calcium on multiple sites and that are generally believed to act as passive calcium buffers in cells. We find that multisite calcium-binding…
Contact inhibition plays a crucial role in the motility of cells, the process of wound healing, and the formation of tumors. By mimicking the mechanical motion of calls crawling on a substrate using a pseudopod, we constructed a minimal…
Effect of molecular crowding and confinement experienced by protein in the cell during unfolding has been studied by modeling a linear polymer chain on a percolation cluster. It is known that internal structure of the cell changes in time,…
The ATP-driven Plasma Membrane Calcium pump or Ca(2+)-ATPase (PMCA) is characterized by a high affinity to calcium and a low transport rate compared to other transmembrane calcium transport proteins. It plays a crucial role for calcium…
We investigate the effect of macromolecular crowding on protein folding, using purely repulsive crowding particles and a self-organizing polymer model of protein folding. We find that the thermodynamics of folding for typical alpha-, beta-…
Calcium dynamics is the highly responsible for intracellular electrical (action potential) and chemical (neurotransmitter) signaling in neuron cell. The Mathematical modeling of calcium dynamics in neurons lead to the reaction diffusion…
Motivated by recent experiments probing shape, size and dynamics of bacterial chromosomes in growing cells, we consider a polymer model consisting of a circular backbone to which side-loops are attached, confined to a cylindrical cell. Such…
The effect of conformational fluctuations of modular macromolecules, such as enzymes, on their diffusion properties is addressed using a simple generic model of an asymmetric dumbbell made of two hydrodynamically coupled subunits. It is…
Understanding the interactions between cells and the extracellular matrix (ECM) during collective cell invasion is crucial for advancements in tissue engineering, cancer therapies, and regenerative medicine. This study focuses on the roles…
Changes in calcium concentration along the sperm flagellum regulate sperm motility and hyperactivation, characterized by an increased flagellar bend amplitude and beat asymmetry, enabling the sperm to reach and penetrate the ovum (egg). The…
The activity of biological cells is primarily based on chemical reactions and typically modeled as a reaction-diffusion system. Cells are, however, highly crowded with macromolecules, including a variety of molecular machines such as…
A strong effort will be dedicated in the coming years to extend the reach of ab initio nuclear-structure calculations to heavy doubly open-shell nuclei. In order to do so, the most efficient strategies to incorporate dominant many-body…
Intracellular transport of vesicular cargos, organelles, and other macromolecules is an essential process to move large items through a crowded, and inhomogeneous cellular environment. In an effort to dissect the fundamental effects of…
The predominant structural protein in vertebrates is collagen, which plays a key role in extracellular matrix and connective tissue mechanics. Despite its prevalence and physical importance in biology, the mechanical properties of molecular…
The complex dynamics of intracellular calcium regulates cellular responses to information encoded in extracellular signals. Here, we study the encoding of these external signals in the context of the Li-Rinzel model. We show that by control…