Title:Computational Protein Design - Where it goes?
Volume: 31
Issue: 20
Author(s): Binbin Xu, Yingjun Chen and Weiwei Xue*
Affiliation:
- Chongqing Key Laboratory of Natural Product Synthesis and Drug Research, School of Pharmaceutical
Sciences, Chongqing University, Chongqing 401331, China
Keywords:
Protein design, machine learning, neural networks, deep learning, molecular modeling, computational protein design.
Abstract: Proteins have been playing a critical role in the regulation of diverse biological
processes related to human life. With the increasing demand, functional proteins are
sparse in this immense sequence space. Therefore, protein design has become an important
task in various fields, including medicine, food, energy, materials, etc. Directed evolution
has recently led to significant achievements. Molecular modification of proteins
through directed evolution technology has significantly advanced the fields of enzyme engineering,
metabolic engineering, medicine, and beyond. However, it is impossible to
identify desirable sequences from a large number of synthetic sequences alone. As a result,
computational methods, including data-driven machine learning and physics-based
molecular modeling, have been introduced to protein engineering to produce more functional
proteins. This review focuses on recent advances in computational protein design,
highlighting the applicability of different approaches as well as their limitations.