We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
The Levinthal paradox of the interactome.
- Authors
Tompa, Peter; Rose, George D
- Abstract
The central biological question of the 21st century is: how does a viable cell emerge from the bewildering combinatorial complexity of its molecular components? Here, we estimate the combinatorics of self-assembling the protein constituents of a yeast cell, a number so vast that the functional interactome could only have emerged by iterative hierarchic assembly of its component sub-assemblies. A protein can undergo both reversible denaturation and hierarchic self-assembly spontaneously, but a functioning interactome must expend energy to achieve viability. Consequently, it is implausible that a completely "denatured" cell could be reversibly renatured spontaneously, like a protein. Instead, new cells are generated by the division of pre-existing cells, an unbroken chain of renewal tracking back through contingent conditions and evolving responses to the origin of life on the prebiotic earth. We surmise that this non-deterministic temporal continuum could not be reconstructed de novo under present conditions.
- Publication
Protein science : a publication of the Protein Society, 2011, Vol 20, Issue 12, p2074
- ISSN
1469-896X
- Publication type
Journal Article
- DOI
10.1002/pro.747