Researchers at North Carolina State University have figured out how copper induces misfolding in the protein associated with Parkinson's disease, leading to creation of the fibrillar plaques which characterize the disease. This finding has implications for both the study of Parkinson's progression, as well as for future treatments.
The protein in question, alpha-synuclein, is the major component of fibrillar plaques found in Parkinson's patients. Researchers had already discovered that certain metals, including copper, could increase the rate of misfolding by binding with the protein, but were unsure of the mechanism by which this binding took place.
"We knew that the copper was interacting with a certain section of the protein, but we didn't have a model for what was happening on the atomic level," says Frisco Rose, Ph.D. candidate in physics and lead author of the paper describing the research. "Think of a huge swing set, with kids all swinging and holding hands that's the protein. Copper is a kid who wants a swing. There are a number of ways that copper could grab a swing, or bind to the protein, and each of those ways would affect all of the other kids on the swing set differently. We wanted to find the specific binding process that leads to misfolding."
Rose and NC State colleagues Dr. Miroslav Hodak, research assistant professor of physics, and Dr. Jerzy Bernholc, Drexel Professor of Physics and Director of the Center for High Performance Simulation, developed a series of computer simulations designed to ferret out the most likely binding scenario.
According to Hodak, "We simulated the interactions of hundreds of thousands of atoms, which required multiple hundred thousand CPU-hour runs to study the onset of misfolding and the dynamics of the partially misfolded structures."
The number of calculations was so large that Hodak and Bernholc had to devise a new method to make it possible for a computer to proces
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| Contact: Tracey Peake tracey_peake@ncsu.edu 919-515-6142 North Carolina State University Source:Eurekalert |
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