Folding Forum

The line in the article below that caused me to make the connection (not that hard) was:

"using a new software system developed by the military for analyzing proteins, ..."

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/science/07bees.html

This was the key line for me...

"The Army software system... is designed to test and identify biological agents in circumstances where commanders might have no idea what sort of threat they face."

It sounds somewhat like Chromatography for proteins. It's used as an identification tool for the virus and fungus attacking the bees. Sounds different than what F@h does.

7im wrote:This was the key line for me...

"The Army software system... is designed to test and identify biological agents in circumstances where commanders might have no idea what sort of threat they face."

It sounds somewhat like Chromatography for proteins. It's used as an identification tool for the virus and fungus attacking the bees. Sounds different than what F@h does.

Thanx 7im. Sounds to me like your guess is a better one (and more informed) than my own.

Still, I wonder how many different places are doing cutting-edge protein folding work and to what extent they're all aware of what the others are doing? In physics, arxiv.org in principle proposes that researchers are better informed of what's going on with other researchers. In principle.

There are many areas of protein research which do not relate to folding and this is one of them. The army is not doing folding work. They're looking for biological agents that can kill.

Whether this leads to a potent agent for chemical warfare (which is outlawed by various international agreements) or to an antidote for such an agent if it exists depends on many factors, but not on learning how and why proteins misfold.