TY - JOUR
T1 - Powering a burnt bridges Brownian ratchet
T2 - A model for an extracellular motor driven by proteolysis of collagen
AU - Saffarian, Saveez
AU - Qian, Hong
AU - Collier, Ivan
AU - Elson, Elliot
AU - Goldberg, Gregory
PY - 2006/4/18
Y1 - 2006/4/18
N2 - Biased diffusion of collagenase on collagen fibrils may represent the first observed adenosine triphosphate-independent extracellular molecular motor. The magnitude of force generated by the enzyme remains unclear. We propose a propulsion mechanism based on a burnt bridges Brownian ratchet model with a varying degree of coupling of the free energy from collagen proteolysis to the enzyme motion. When constrained by experimental observations, our model predicts 0.1 pN stall force for individual collagenase molecules. A dimer, surprisingly, can generate a force in the range of 5 pN, suggesting that the motor can be of biological significance.
AB - Biased diffusion of collagenase on collagen fibrils may represent the first observed adenosine triphosphate-independent extracellular molecular motor. The magnitude of force generated by the enzyme remains unclear. We propose a propulsion mechanism based on a burnt bridges Brownian ratchet model with a varying degree of coupling of the free energy from collagen proteolysis to the enzyme motion. When constrained by experimental observations, our model predicts 0.1 pN stall force for individual collagenase molecules. A dimer, surprisingly, can generate a force in the range of 5 pN, suggesting that the motor can be of biological significance.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=33645700220&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1103/PhysRevE.73.041909
DO - 10.1103/PhysRevE.73.041909
M3 - Article
C2 - 16711838
AN - SCOPUS:33645700220
SN - 1539-3755
VL - 73
JO - Physical Review E - Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics
JF - Physical Review E - Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics
IS - 4
M1 - 041909
ER -