The Effect of Attractive Interactions and Macromolecular Crowding on Crystallins Association.

ABSTRACT: In living systems proteins are typically found in crowded environments where their effective interactions strongly depend on the surrounding medium. Yet, their association and dissociation needs to be robustly controlled in order to enable biological function. Uncontrolled protein aggregation often causes disease. For instance, cataract is caused by the clustering of lens proteins, i.e., crystallins, resulting in enhanced light scattering and impaired vision or blindness. To investigate the molecular origins of cataract formation and to design efficient treatments, a better understanding of crystallin association in macromolecular crowded environment is needed. Here we present a theoretical study of simple coarse grained colloidal models to characterize the general features of how the asso

SUBMITTER: Wei J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4783108 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature