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06:55
Synthesis of Cyclic Polymers and Characterization of Their Diffusive Motion in the Melt State at the Single Molecule Level
Published on: September 26, 2016
Nucleated polymerization with secondary pathways. III. Equilibrium behavior and oligomer populations
Samuel I A Cohen1, Michele Vendruscolo, Christopher M Dobson
1Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, Lensfield Road, Cambridge CB2 1EW, United Kingdom.
The Journal of Chemical Physics
|August 17, 2011
Summary
Filament length distributions reach a steady state then shift towards smaller fragments upon monomer depletion. This study reveals key dynamics in filament polymerization and fragmentation relevant to protein aggregation.
Area of Science:
- Biophysics
- Polymer Science
Background:
- Filamentous protein aggregation is implicated in various diseases.
- Understanding the dynamics of filament growth and fragmentation is crucial for biological insights.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the long-time behavior and equilibrium properties of growing linear filaments.
- To analyze the length distribution evolution and oligomer concentration over time.
- To connect these polymerization dynamics to biological consequences of protein aggregation.
Main Methods:
- Modeling nucleated polymerization of linear filaments.
- Analyzing steady-state and equilibrium length distributions.
- Calculating time evolution of oligomer concentrations.
Main Results:
- Filament length distributions evolve through two limiting cases: steady-state and equilibrium.
- Equilibrium distribution is biased towards smaller fragments due to monomer depletion.
- Oligomers persist at equilibrium for breakable filaments, unlike non-breakable ones.
Conclusions:
- Polymerization dynamics significantly influence filament length distributions and fragment concentrations.
- Fragmentation plays a critical role in the equilibrium state of filamentous systems.
- These findings have implications for understanding and potentially mitigating filamentous protein aggregation in biological systems.
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