Modeling Virus Self-Assembly Pathways: Avoiding Dynamics Using Geometric Constraint Decomposition

We develop a model for elucidating the assembly pathways by which an icosahedral viral shell forms from 60 identical constituent protein monomers. This poorly understood process a remarkable example of macromolecular self-assembly occuring in nature and possesses many features that are desirable while engineering self-assembly at the nanoscale. The model uses static geometric and tensegrity constraints to represent the driving (weak) forces that cause a viral shell to assemble and hold it together. The goal is to answer focused questions about the structural properties of a successful assembly pathway. Pathways and their properties are carefully defined and computed using computational algebra and geometry, specifically state-of-art concepts in geometric constraint decomposition. The model is analyzable and refinable and avoids expensive dynamics. We show that it has a provably tractable and accurate computational simulation and that its predictions are roughly consistent with known i...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2006
• Where: JCB
• Authors: Meera Sitharam, Mavis Agbandje-Mckenna
• Keywords: Computational Algebra, Icosahedral Viral Shell, JCB 2006, Viral Shell