- Previous Article
- Next Article
- Table of Contents
Journal of Physical Chemistry B, Vol.121, No.34, 8009-8025, 2017
Crowding in Cellular Environments at an Atomistic Level from Computer Simulations
The effects of crowding in biological environments on biomolecular structure, dynamics, and function remain not well understood. Computer simulations of atomistic models of concentrated peptide and protein systems at different levels of complexity are beginning to provide new insights. Crowding, weak interactions with other macromolecules and metabolites, and. altered solvent properties within cellular environments appear to remodel the energy landscape of peptides and proteins in significant ways including the possibility of native state destabilization. Crowding,is also seen to affect dynamic properties, both conformational dynamics and diffusional properties of macromolecules. Recent simulations that address these questions are reviewed here and discussed in the context of relevant experiments.