Levinthal paradox

The Levinthal paradox in molecular biology is the observation that proteins fold into their specific three-dimensional conformations in a timespan that is much shorter (on the order of milliseconds) than would be possible if the molecule actually searched the entire conformation space for the lowest energy state . The Levinthal paradox is named after Cyrus Levinthal .

It has been argued that the paradox can be settled if one views each atom as independently computing in its neighbourhood; that is, the atoms compute in parallel whereas the theoretical calculation assumes a sequential search.

External links

• http://brian.ch.cam.ac.uk/~mark/levinthal/levinthal.html
• http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.07/blue_pr.html