title: The Hofmeister series and protein-salt interactions.
abstract: In order to understand the origin of the Hofmeister series, a statistical-mechanical analysis, based upon the Kirkwood-Buff (KB) theory, has been performed to extract information regarding protein hydration and water-mediated protein-salt interactions from published experimental data-preferential hydration and volumetric data for bovine serum albumin in the presence of a wide range of salts. The analysis showed a linear correlation between the preferential hydration parameter and the protein-cosolvent KB parameter. The same linear correlation holds even when nonelectrolyte cosolvents, such as polyethelene glycol, have been incorporated. These results suggest that the Hofmeister series is due to a wide variation of the water-mediated protein-cosolvent interaction (but not the change of protein hydration) and that this mechanism is a special case of a more general scenario common even to the macromolecular crowding.
authors.affiliation: York Structural Biology Laboratory, Department of Chemistry, University of York-Heslington, York, North Yorkshire YO10 5YW, United Kingdom. shimizu@ysbl.york.ac.uk
authors.forename: Seishi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Shimizu
authors.forename: William M
authors.initials: WM
authors.lastname: McLaren
authors.forename: Nobuyuki
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Matubayasi
mesh_terms: D002413:Cations, Divalent / Q000737:chemistry; D016014:Linear Models; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D011506:Proteins / Q000737:chemistry*; D012492:Salts / Q000737:chemistry*; D014867:Water / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D002413:Cations, Divalent; D011506:Proteins; D012492:Salts; D014867:Water