Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 6, 2025

Sedimentation Equilibrium of a Small Oligomer-forming Membrane Protein: Effect of Histidine Protonation on Pentameric Stability
Published on: April 2, 2015
Strong electrostatic attraction drives milk heteroprotein complex coacervation
Isabel Vinterbladh1, Rima Hachfi Soussi2, Jan Forsman1
1Division of Computational Chemistry, Lund University, Naturvetarvägen 24, SE-223 62 Lund, Sweden.
Abstract:
Coacervates of oppositely charged milk proteins are used in functional food development, mainly to encapsulate bioactives. To uncover the driving forces behind coacervates formation, we study the association of lactoferrin and β-lactoglobulin at amino-acid level detail, using molecular simulations. Our findings show that inter-protein electrostatic interactions dominate and are, surprisingly, equally divided between an isotropic part, due to monopole-monopole attraction of the oppositely charged proteins, and an anisotropic part due to uneven surface charge distributions. In good agreement with recent experimental association constants, the calculated protein-protein interaction free energy is strongly dependent on pH and salt concentration. In addition to thermodynamics, we also investigate amino acid contacts in microstates of trimeric and pentameric protein complexes, and identify interaction hot-spots that drive heteroprotein complex coacervation process.
More Related Videos
08:55Characterization of Multi-subunit Protein Complexes of Human MxA Using Non-denaturing Polyacrylamide Gel-electrophoresis
Published on: October 28, 2016
05:45Capillary Electrophoresis-based Hydrogen/Deuterium Exchange for Conformational Characterization of Proteins with Top-down Mass Spectrometry
Published on: June 8, 2021
Related Concept Videos
Noncovalent Attractions in Biomolecules
Four types of noncovalent interactions are hydrogen bonds, van der Waals forces, ionic bonds, and hydrophobic interactions.
Hydrogen bonding results from the electrostatic attraction of a hydrogen atom covalently bonded to a strong-electronegative atom like oxygen,...
Aqueous Solutions and Heats of Hydration
When ionic compounds dissolve in water, the ions in the solid separate and disperse uniformly throughout the solution because water molecules surround and solvate the ions, reducing the strong electrostatic forces between them. This process...
Intermolecular Forces
Colloidal precipitates
Coagulation
Colloids