Reversible Effects of Peptide Concentration and Lipid Composition on H-Ras Lipid Anchor Clustering.

ABSTRACT: Dynamic clusters of lipid-anchored Ras proteins are important for high-fidelity signal transduction in cells. The average size of Ras nanoclusters was reported to be independent of protein expression levels, and cholesterol depletion is commonly used to test the raft-preference of nanoclusters. However, whether protein concentration and membrane domain stability affect Ras clustering in a reversible manner is not well understood. We used coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations to examine the reversibility of the effects of peptide and cholesterol concentrations as well as a lipid domain-perturbing nanoparticle (C60) on the dynamics and stability of H-Ras lipid-anchor nanoclusters. By comparing results from these simulations with previous observations from the literature, we show that

SUBMITTER: Lin X 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4699922 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature