RESEARCH ARTICLE
Characterizing Protein Shape by a Volume Distribution Asymmetry Index
Nicola Arrigo1, Paola Paci2, Luisa Di Paola*, 1, Daniele Santoni3, Micol De Ruvo1, Alessandro Giuliani5, Filippo Castiglione4
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2012Volume: 6
First Page: 20
Last Page: 27
Publisher ID: TOBIOIJ-6-20
DOI: 10.2174/1875036201206010020
Article History:
Received Date: 21/11/2011Revision Received Date: 20/12/2011
Acceptance Date: 23/12/2011
Electronic publication date: 09/05/2012
Collection year: 2012
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
A fully quantitative shape index relying upon the asymmetry of mass distribution of protein molecules along the three space dimensions is proposed. Multidimensional statistical analysis, based on principal component extraction and subsequent linear discriminant analysis, showed the presence of three major ‘attractor forms’ roughly correspondent to rod-like, discoidal and spherical shapes. This classification of protein shapes was in turn demonstrated to be strictly connected with topological features of proteins, as emerging from complex network invariants of their contact maps.