What has de novo protein design taught us about protein folding and biophysics?
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Recent progress in de novo protein design has led to an explosion of new protein structures, functions and assemblies. In this essay, I consider how the successes and failures in this new area inform our understanding of the proteins in nature and, more generally, the predictive computational modeling of biological systems.
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The large number of designed proteins made with no explicit design of a pathway provides concrete evidence against the need for a specific folding pathway.
“More concrete evidence for this conclusion is provided by the large number of designed proteins that have now been made, with no explicit design of a pathway46.”
From Critical assessment of methods of protein structure prediction (CASP)—Round <scp>XIV</scp> (2021) · cites this paper as [46]
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References 23 · Cited by 161
- Authors
- Baker, D.
- Affiliations
- University of Washington (US)
- Corresponding author
- Baker, David
- ORCID
- Baker, David
- Venue
- Protein Science
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2019-03-19
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 678-683
- ISSN
- 0961-8368 (ISSN-L)
- 1469-896X
- PMC
- PMC6423711
- OpenAlex
- W2911475376
- Cited by
- 161
- References
- 23
- Citations by year
- 2026: 14 · 2025: 12 · 2024: 21 · 2023: 20 · 2022: 23 · 2021: 32 · 2020: 28 · 2019: 11
- FWCI
- 7.73
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Protein Science (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Protein Structure and Dynamics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › RNA and protein synthesis mechanisms
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Chemical Synthesis and Analysis
- Keywords
- de novo protein design, protein folding, protein structure prediction, computational modeling of biological systems, protein biophysics
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Humans, Kinetics, Protein Conformation, Proteins, Thermodynamics, Protein Folding, Protein Stability, Biophysical Phenomena
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