Self-assembly and evolution of homomeric protein complexes.
Phys Rev Lett 102:11 (2009) 118106
Authors:
Gabriel Villar, Alex W Wilber, Alex J Williamson, Parvinder Thiara, Jonathan PK Doye, Ard A Louis, Mara N Jochum, Anna CF Lewis, Emmanuel D Levy
Abstract:
We introduce a simple "patchy particle" model to study the thermodynamics and dynamics of self-assembly of homomeric protein complexes. Our calculations allow us to rationalize recent results for dihedral complexes. Namely, why evolution of such complexes naturally takes the system into a region of interaction space where (i) the evolutionarily newer interactions are weaker, (ii) subcomplexes involving the stronger interactions are observed to be thermodynamically stable on destabilization of the protein-protein interactions, and (iii) the self-assembly dynamics are hierarchical with these same subcomplexes acting as kinetic intermediates.
