The phenomenon of molecular recognition, which underpins almost all biological processes, is dynamic, complex and subtle. Establishing an interaction between a pair of molecules involves mutual structural rearrangements guided by a highly convoluted energy landscape, the accurate mapping of which continues to elude us. Increased understanding of the degree to which the conformational space of a...

Intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) play important roles in proteins that regulate gene expression. A prominent example is the intracellular domain of the Notch receptor (NICD), which regulates the transcription of Notch-responsive genes. The NICD sequence includes an intrinsically disordered RAM region and a conserved ankyrin (ANK) domain. The 111-residue RAM region mediates bivalent inter...

Vitamin D Receptor (VDR) belongs to the nuclear receptor (NR) superfamily. Whereas the structure of the ligand binding domain (LBD) of VDR has been determined in great detail, the role of its amino acid residues in stabilizing the structure and ligand triggering conformational change is still under debate. There are 13 α-helices and one β-sheet in the VDR LBD and they form a three-layer sandwic...

Conformational change in protein-ligand complexes is widely modeled, but the protein accommodation expected on binding a congeneric series of ligands has received less attention. Given their use in medicinal chemistry, there are surprisingly few substantial series of congeneric ligand complexes in the Protein Data Bank (PDB). Here we determine the structures of eight alkyl benzenes, in single-m...

The effect of conformational changes in the gate arm of a three-terminal device is investigated. In the ground state, the gate (triphenyl) arm is nonplanar, where the middle phenyl ring is approximately 30° out-of-plane relative to other two rings. At this geometry, the calculated tunnel current (Id) as a function of external bias (Vds) across the two D−A substituted arms exhibits a typical ins...

background and objective: familial hypercholesterolemia (fh) is an autosomal trait, which is caused by mutations in low density lipoprotein receptor (ldlr) gene. fh penetrance is about 100% and worldwide prevalence for heterozygous subjects is almost 1 in 500 and for homozygous 1 in 1,000,000. the patients are at risk of premature coronary heart disease (chd) due to defective ldlr and hence cho...

A library of 14-helical hexa β(3)-peptides was synthesized in order to determine the influence of sequence variation as well as staple size and location on conformational stability. From this study we show that appropriately stapled hexa-β(3)-peptides can allow for a number of variations without significant perturbation of the 14-helix.