Biologists describe details of new mechanism for molecular interactions
(Phys.org)—Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, with collaborators from Harvard University, the University of Madrid, Princeton University, and the University of Zurich, have discovered a new mechanism that may alter principle understandings of molecular interactions within a cell's nucleus. The discovery illustrates how two proteins of the human adenovirus use DNA as an efficient form of transportation inside a newly synthesized virus particle. The proteins use what the scientists are calling a "molecular sled," which slides along the DNA double helix-much like a train running along its tracks-to find and interact with other proteins. In a series of four papers published back to back online October 7, 2012, in the Journal of Biological Chemistry under the title "Regulation of a viral proteinase by a peptide and DNA in one-dimensional space," the group, led by Brookhaven biophysicist Walter F. Mangel, has raised the possibility that all...