Protein domain connectivity and essentiality

Abstract

Protein-protein interactions can be properly modeled as scale-free complex networks, while the lethality of proteins has been correlated with the node degrees, therefore defining a lethality-centrality rule. In this work we revisit this relevant problem by focusing attention not on proteins as a whole, but on their functional domains, which are ultimately responsible for their binding potential. Four networks are considered: the original protein-protein interaction network, its randomized version, and two domain networks assuming different lethality hypotheses. By using formal statistical analysis, we show that the correlation between connectivity and essentiality is higher for domains than for proteins.