Pressure Studies of Protein Dynamics
Abstract
Our work during the past decade has shown conclusively that the energy landscape of proteins is complex: The ground state of proteins is highly degenerate and consists of a very large number of energy valleys separated by energy mountains and ridges. Moreover, the energy landscape may be hierarchical and contain valleys within valleys. Evidence is mounting that many, maybe all, complex systems are characterized by a highly degenerate and hierarchicaly arranged ground state. Among such systems and problems are glasses, spin glasses, evolution, learning, neural networks, computer and chip design, and the traveling salesman problem. Proteins consequently may be models for many other systems and progress in protein dynamics may have impact on these other fields. We investigate three aspects of protein dynamics: (1) the structure and organization of the energy landscape, (2) conformational motions (dynamics), and (3) the laws governing the motions (reaction theory). In all three aspects, we intend to study the phenomena in one protein (myoglobin) in detail and then explore how the phenomena depend on changes in protein structure. Keywords: Pressure, Protein dynamics, Myoglobin, Heme proteins, Conformational substates, Photolysis, Fourier spectroscopy.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Feb 28, 1990
- Accession Number
- ADA218559
Entities
People
- Hans Frauenfelder
- Robert D. Young
Organizations
- University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign