Post-genome Era and Importance of Protein Thermodynamics

Abstract

It is described that genomic-DNA sequence analyses of many living organisms have been completed, and studies on structural and functional genomics are now proceeding. The dual nature of natural proteins is remarked that they have two different aspects of technological and scientific entities, which is distinct from industrial functional elements. Characteristic aspects of the molecular thermodynamic quantities of proteins, and their physical and biological implications are explained including the enthalpy-entropy compensation and the large positive heat-capacity change in protein denaturation. Finally, perspectives on the research of protein thermodynamics at the post-genome era are presented and a possibility of the development of protein science in the expanded sequence space is discussed.