Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Laboratoire de Biophysique Statistique, ITP-SB, BSP-720, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland.
Phys Biol. 2009 Nov 12;6(4):046014. doi: 10.1088/1478-3975/6/4/046014.
Proteins are large and complex molecular machines. In order to perform their function, most of them need energy, e.g. either in the form of a photon, as in the case of the visual pigment rhodopsin, or through the breaking of a chemical bond, as in the presence of adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Such energy, in turn, has to be transmitted to specific locations, often several tens of A away from where it is initially released. Here we show, within the framework of a coarse-grained nonlinear network model, that energy in a protein can jump from site to site with high yields, covering in many instances remarkably large distances. Following single-site excitations, few specific sites are targeted, systematically within the stiffest regions. Such energy transfers mark the spontaneous formation of a localized mode of nonlinear origin at the destination site, which acts as an efficient energy-accumulating center. Interestingly, yields are found to be optimum for excitation energies in the range of biologically relevant ones.
蛋白质是大型且复杂的分子机器。为了发挥其功能，它们中的大多数都需要能量，例如以光子的形式，就像视觉色素视紫红质那样，或者通过打破化学键的形式，就像三磷酸腺苷（ATP）存在的情况下那样。这种能量反过来又必须传递到特定的位置，通常距离最初释放的位置有数十个Å。在这里，我们在粗粒度非线性网络模型的框架内表明，蛋白质中的能量可以以高产率从一个位置跳跃到另一个位置，在许多情况下可以覆盖非常大的距离。在单个位置激发之后，少数特定的位置被系统地靶向到最坚硬的区域。这种能量转移标志着在目标位置自发形成了一种具有非线性起源的局部模式，该模式充当有效的能量积累中心。有趣的是，发现产量对于生物相关范围内的激发能量是最佳的。
