Question 4 Prions (pronounced pree-ahns) are agents that cause a novel type of f

Question

Question 4 Prions (pronounced pree-ahns) are agents that cause a novel type of fatal brain disease. Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE or mad cow disease), sheep scrapie and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) of humans are examples of prion diseases. Prions enter cells and convert normal proteins found within the cells into prions just like themselves. The normal cell proteins have all the same "parts" as the prions-specifically the same amino acid building blocks-but fold differently they a) What is the primary structure of a protein? What force or forces (covalent bonds, ionic rimary structure? b) What is the secondary structure of a protein? What force or forces (covalent bonds, ionic bonds, hydrogen bonds, or van der waals forces) are involved in secondary structure? c) What is the tertiary structure of a protein? What force or forces (covalent bonds, ionic bonds, hydrogen bonds, or van der waals forces) are involved in tertiary structure? d) Do you expect both the normal and the infectious versions of a prion protein to have the same primary structure? Why or why not. e) Do you expect both the normal and the infectious versions of a prion protein to have the same tertiary structure? Why or why not.

Explanation / Answer

a) Primary structure of protein is just the sequence of amino acids and there is only C-N peptide bond which is a type of covalent bond and proteine structure is stablize by hydrophobic forces between side chains.

b) Secondary structure of protein have spacial arrangment of primary struction and have regular conformation. Seconadry structure stablizes by only hydrogen bonds.

c) tertiary structure: It is three dimensional structure of proteine. The tertiary structure is stabilized by the sequence of hydrophobic amino acid residues in the backbone of the protein. The interior consists on hydrophobic side chains while the surface consists of hydrophilic amino acids that interact with the aqueous environment.

d) yes , Because prion proteins has abnormal protein conformation that itself propagate as infectious protein but the primary amino acid sequection rather same in both.

e) No, Both have different tertiary structure because this structure determines the function of a native proteins. This tertiary structure gives the active conformation of the protein that's why prions has abnormal folded protein or conformation which itself forms deiffernt kind of aggregation or abnormalities in function while normal protein do its functions normally.

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