Importance of Metastable States in the Free Energy Landscapes of Polypeptide Chains

Details Importance of Metastable States in the Free Energy Landscapes of Polypeptide Chains Importance of Metastable States in the Free Energy Landscapes of Polypeptide Chains

2007-10-18

arxiv.org/abs/0710.3532v1

Physical Review Letters, 99 178104 (2007)

Physics

Condensed Matter

Soft Condensed Matter

4 pages, 3 figures

Scientific paper

10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.178104

We show that the interplay between excluded volume effects, hydrophobicity, and hydrogen bonding of a tube-like representation of a polypeptide chain gives rise to free energy landscapes that exhibit a small number of metastable minima corresponding to common structural motifs observed in proteins. The complexity of the landscape increases only moderately with the length of the chain. Analysis of the temperature dependence of these landscapes reveals that the stability of specific metastable states is maximal at a temperature close to the mid-point of folding. These mestastable states are therefore likely to be of particular significance in determining the generic tendency of proteins to aggregate into potentially pathogenic agents.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

Importance of Metastable States in the Free Energy Landscapes of Polypeptide Chains does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Importance of Metastable States in the Free Energy Landscapes of Polypeptide Chains, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Importance of Metastable States in the Free Energy Landscapes of Polypeptide Chains will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-461379