The role of the energy gap in protein folding dynamics

Abstract

The dynamics of folding of proteins is studied by means of a phenomenological master equation. The energy distribution is taken as a truncated exponential for the misfolded states plus a native state sitting below the continuum. The influence of the gap on the folding dynamics is studied, for various models of the transition probabilities between the different states of the protein. We show that for certain models, the relaxation to the native state is accelerated by increasing the gap, whereas for others it is slowed down .