Protein synthesis kinetic proofreading

J. J. Hopfield. The energy relay a proofreading scheme based on dynamic cooperativity and lacking all characteristic symptoms of kinetic proofreading in DNA replication and protein synthesis. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 77 5248-5252, 1980. 

The study of evolutionary trees seems to indicate that almost no natural selection was invoked in the choice of proteins [1]. The selection appears to be random. One thus tends to think the selection was guided by the stability of the protein and the efficiency in the active site region. A different view has emerged recently. The synthesis of proteins after all went through a selection process, but one implemented at the molecular level, and the fitness was determined by none other than water. We describe and develop this view briefly here. The process of selection by elimination of error in protein synthesis is known as kinetic proofreading (KPR), which is applied generally to the selectivity of enzymes towards substrate absorption and conversion to product. However, more specifically, it applies to the avoidance of error in protein synthesis. Here we shall first discuss KPR from a general point of view, with application to protein synthesis and DNA replication. 

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