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Updated: Apr 3, 2026

Author Spotlight: A Bicelle Crystallization Setup for ABC Transporter Membrane Proteins to Advance Drug Development
Published on: August 25, 2023
Thermodynamics of ABC transporters
Xuejun C Zhang1, Lei Han2, Yan Zhao2
1National Laboratory of Macromolecules, National Center of Protein Science-Beijing, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China. zhangc@ibp.ac.cn.
Abstract:
ABC transporters form the largest of all transporter families, and their structural study has made tremendous progress over recent years. However, despite such advances, the precise mechanisms that determine the energy-coupling between ATP hydrolysis and the conformational changes following substrate binding remain to be elucidated. Here, we present our thermodynamic analysis for both ABC importers and exporters, and introduce the two new concepts of differential-binding energy and elastic conformational energy into the discussion. We hope that the structural analysis of ABC transporters will henceforth take thermodynamic aspects of transport mechanisms into account as well.
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