Protein (IMAGE)
Caption
Two types of aggregate structures found in new work by researchers at Rice University are shown in three-dimensional (top) and simplified two-dimensional (bottom) representations. In the 2-D model, bold colors indicate the actual structures found in the AWSEM molecular dynamics simulations and the light colors are examples of how these structures might further develop in the presence of more protein copies. In each protein, there are two sticky segments, shown in orange and blue. A solid line represents the rest of each protein. Dashed lines represent stabilizing interactions formed between two sticky segments from different proteins. A fibrillar structure is shown on the left and a branching structure is shown on the right. The presence of two or more sticky segments in one protein allows for a greater diversity of possible aggregate structures. This realization should spur protein scientists to design experiments to investigate these different types of structures and their potential role in misfolding-related diseases.
Credit
Weihua Zheng and Nick Schafer/Rice University
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