Protein-based machines conversion

These results of 18 years ago, demonstrating the capacity of de wovo-designed model protein-based machines for the conversion of chemical energy into mechanical work, remain unex-... 

Protein-based Machines as Catalysts for Energy Conversion... 

Another example is the Principle of Le ChStelier, which may be stated as follows For any system at rest (at equilibrium) the introduction of a stress (in our case an input energy) causes the system to react in such a way as to relieve the stress (in our case by an output energy). This principle reasonably describes protein-catalyzed energy conversion, that is, the function of protein-based machines. Under prescribed conditions, properly designed model protein-based machines exhibit a behavior where for each action there is a reaction. In section 5.4, regardless of the action, which was any one of several different input energies, the performance of mechanical work was the reac-... 

Systematic Classification of Energy Conversions by Consilient Protein-based Machines... 

D.W. Urry, S.Q. Peng, L.C. Hayes, D.T. McPherson, Jie Xu, T.C. Woods, D.C. Gowda, and A. Pattanaik, Engineering Protein-based Machines to Emulate Key Steps of Metabolism (Biological Energy Conversion). Biotechnol. Bioeng., 58,175-190,1998. 

More to the point, we now see biology s access to energy by means of the consilient mechanism of energy conversion, combined with readily available mutations to improve protein-based machines, as the source of increased structural order and functional diversity. 

One of the more challenging locations, therefore, for consideration of the comprehensive hydrophobic effect in the panoply of biological energy conversions is the electron transport chain embedded within the inner mitochondrial membrane. Essential parts of these protein-based machines insert into and function in very hydrophobic lipid bilayers. Here the ingress and egress of protons for develop-... 

The second point addresses the nature of elastic force development in relation to imder-standing efficient energy conversion. If the energy required for chain deformation during elastic force development becomes lost to other parts of the protein and to the surrounding water, then so too is efficient energy conversion lost. In other words, elastomeric force development on deformation in a protein-based machine followed by marked hysteresis on relaxation necessarily denotes an inefficient protein-based machine. 

Table 8.1. Standard Free Energies of Hydrolysis of Phosphate Bonds directly involved in Energy Conversion by Protein-based Machines. ...

In general, then, the energy conversions of biology reduce to the production of ATP and the uses of ATP, that is, the production of ATP by the five protein-based machines of the inner mitochondrial membrane and the thousands of subsequent protein-based machines that do the necessary work of the cell. This constitutes yet an enormous task that will fill hundreds of volumes in the future of protein-based machines. The intention of this volume, however, is to add a simplifying feature of a common groundwork of explanation for each of the hydrophobic and elastic consilient mechanisms. For the function of protein-based machines of biology, this perspective recovers an attractive element of simplification. 

---