National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 39(115), p. 9744-9749, 2018
Full text: Download
Significance Efficient synthesis and folding of proteins, avoiding misfolded states, are central to cell function. As folding may be initiated in parallel with translation, key experimental challenges are to map changes that occur in folding free energy landscapes as translation proceeds and to understand how these landscapes might be modulated by the ribosome and auxiliary factors. Here, we study the length-dependent folding of a domain from a tandem repeat protein and solve the structure of a stable folding intermediate. Although destabilized by the ribosome at equilibrium, modeling of the nonequilibrium folding pathway nevertheless indicates a significant role for proline isomerization during translation. We develop a simple model to explore the impact of cotranslational folding kinetics on misfolding hazards.