Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Sarkar M
PROVIDER: S-EPMC3845188 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Nov
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Sarkar Mohona M Smith Austin E AE Pielak Gary J GJ
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20131111 48
Protein stability is usually studied in simple buffered solutions, but most proteins function inside cells, where the heterogeneous and crowded environment presents a complex, nonideal system. Proteins are expected to behave differently under cellular crowding owing to two types of contacts: hard-core repulsions and weak, chemical interactions. The effect of hard-core repulsions is purely entropic, resulting in volume exclusion owing to the mere presence of the crowders. The weak interactions ca ...[more]