Surface Hydrophobicity Strongly Influences Adsorption and Conformation of Amyloid Beta Derived Peptides

The formation of amyloid fibrils is a common feature of many protein systems. It has implications in both health, as amyloid fibrils are implicated in over 30 degenerative diseases, and in the biological functions of proteins. Surfaces have long been known to affect the formation of fibrils but the specific effect depends on the details of both the surface and protein. Fully understanding the role of surfaces in fibrillization requires microscopic information on protein conformation on surfaces. In this paper replica exchange molecular dynamics simulation is used to investigate the model fibril forming protein, Aβ(10-40) (a 31-residue segment of the amyloid-beta protein) on surfaces of different hydrophobicity. Similar to other proteins Aβ(10-40) is found to adsorb strongly onto hydrophobic surfaces. It also adopts significantly different sets of conformations on hydrophobic and polar surfaces, as well as in bulk solution. On hydrophobic surfaces, it adopts partially helical structures, with the helices overlapping with beta-strand regions in the mature fibril. These may be helical intermediates on the fibril formation pathway, suggesting a mechanism for the enhanced fibril formation seen on hydrophobic surfaces.