title: Modeling and simulation of biological self-assembly structures from nanoscale entities.
abstract: Many natural and biological systems are formed by the process of molecular self-assembly. Molecular self-assembly is defined as the spontaneous organization of molecules under thermodynamic equilibrium conditions into structurally well defined and rather stable arrangements. In this paper, we developed a novel computational methodology to investigate the self-assembly process of simple 1-D structures representing protein monomers into long filaments, rings, pyramids, bundles, etc. Based on the preliminary results obtained, the methodology was extended to mimic the microtubule self-assembly, which occurs in all eukaryotic cells.
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia 23284, USA.
authors.forename: Ramana M
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Pidaparti
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Primeaux
authors.forename: Brandon
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Saunders
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003198:Computer Simulation; D049329:Nanostructures