Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2018
Keywords
Intrinsically Disordered Protein, Catalytic Activity, Conformational Dynamics, Origin of Life Theory
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.3390/biom8040179
Abstract
To gain a new insight into the role of proteins in the origin of life on Earth, we present the Janus Challenge: identify an intrinsically disordered protein (IDP), naturally occurring or synthetic, that has catalytic activity. For example, such a catalytic IDP may perform condensation reactions to catalyze a peptide bond or a phosphodiester bond formation utilizing natural/un-natural amino acids or nucleotides, respectively. The IDP may also have autocatalytic, de novo synthesis, or self-replicative activity. Meeting this challenge may not only shed new light and provide an alternative to the RNA world hypothesis, but it may also serve as an impetus for technological advances with important biomedical applications.
Rights Information
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Was this content written or created while at USF?
Yes
Citation / Publisher Attribution
Biomolecules, v. 8, issue 4, art. 179
Scholar Commons Citation
Kulkarni, Prakash and Uversky, Vladimir N., "Intrinsically Disordered Proteins and the Janus Challenge" (2018). Molecular Medicine Faculty Publications. 876.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/mme_facpub/876
