Placeholder image of a protein
Icon representing a puzzle

443 (<150): Mini Arabidopsis Multi-Start Puzzle

Closed since over 14 years ago

Intermediate

Summary

Created
July 27, 2011
Expires
Max points
100
Description

This small unsolved Arabidopsis protein only has 59 residues and negatively controls the biosynthesis of starch in plants and regulates leaf and seed composition. We are giving you 5 Zhang server models as starts for this puzzle. Each time you reset the puzzle one of them will randomly be chosen. They are also in the Alignment Tool so you can use partial threading and an extended chain. More info in the puzzle comments. For players with fewer than 150 global points.

Top groups

  1. Avatar for Anthropic Dreams
    1. Anthropic Dreams
    100 pts. 9,051
  2. Avatar for BOINC@Poland 2. BOINC@Poland 41 pts. 8,858
  3. Avatar for Deleted group 3. Deleted group pts. 8,825
  4. Avatar for Czech National Team 4. Czech National Team 4 pts. 8,538
  5. Avatar for Crunching Family 5. Crunching Family 1 pt. 8,521
  6. Avatar for DSN @ Home 6. DSN @ Home 1 pt. 8,131
  7. Avatar for Void Crushers 7. Void Crushers 1 pt. 6,270
  1. Avatar for Suitkees 31. Suitkees Lv 1 1 pt. 8,367
  2. Avatar for Ungoliant 32. Ungoliant Lv 1 1 pt. 8,349
  3. Avatar for DangerDude 33. DangerDude Lv 1 1 pt. 8,328
  4. Avatar for rinze 34. rinze Lv 1 1 pt. 8,311
  5. Avatar for Pod_289287 35. Pod_289287 Lv 1 1 pt. 8,306
  6. Avatar for ctlaltdel 36. ctlaltdel Lv 1 1 pt. 8,301
  7. Avatar for jjoohhnn 37. jjoohhnn Lv 1 1 pt. 8,277
  8. Avatar for aspadistra 38. aspadistra Lv 1 1 pt. 8,131
  9. Avatar for aeretza 39. aeretza Lv 1 1 pt. 7,822
  10. Avatar for Max Flow 40. Max Flow Lv 1 1 pt. 6,907

Comments

beta_helix Staff Lv 1

In the long term, it has potential applications in controlling the amount of oil, protein, and/or starch that is stored in seeds. The mechanism by which it regulates composition is not understood.

Solving this structure would not only help guide our experimentation to test its structure, but also help us in understanding its potential regulatory partners, and ultimately in understanding how carbon flux in plants is controlled.

More info about how this protein negatively controls the bio-synthesis of starch in plants and regulates leaf and seed composition:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-313X.2009.03793.x/full