Recently there have been many rosetta@home submissions that relate to design of novel proteins. This thread opens up discussion on this type of proteins.

The particular type of structure I'm working on has 2 or 3 helices that repeat. We are trying to design aspects of these proteins such as controlling how the protein bends. These proteins should be useful in designing unique binders and structures attached to one another like legos to build higher-order structures like tubes.

The most recent runs named g_ are tests of repeat proteins that I have recently designed and successfully tested in the lab! So we're already seeing some early success.

-TJ

For those that are not aware, a "novel" protein is one that does not exist in nature. So TJ is referring to devising an amino acid sequence that is unique, then predicting what shape it will take (using Rosetta@home). Then to say there are successful tests in the lab, that means the specific sequence was actually created, and it's structure found using other means (such as x-ray crystallography or NMR), and the structure found very closely matches the predicted structure.

Being able to create a novel protein is a necessity if you hope to create proteins that target specific viruses or diseases. And that created protein won't do much good unless you accurately predict that the shape it takes will bind to the desired target.

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Rosetta Moderator: Mod.Sense