Phys. Rev. Lett. 90, 248101 (2003) [4 pages]Viral Self-Assembly as a Thermodynamic ProcessReceived 6 November 2002; published 17 June 2003 The protein shells, or capsids, of nearly all spherelike viruses adopt icosahedral symmetry. In the present Letter, we propose a statistical thermodynamic model for viral self-assembly. We find that icosahedral symmetry is not expected for viral capsids constructed from structurally identical protein subunits and that this symmetry requires (at least) two internal “switching” configurations of the protein. Our results indicate that icosahedral symmetry is not a generic consequence of free energy minimization but requires optimization of internal structural parameters of the capsid proteins. © 2003 The American Physical Society URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.90.248101
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevLett.90.248101
PACS:
87.15.Nn, 61.50.Ah, 81.16.Dn, 87.16.Dg
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