I understand that prions are misfolded in a way that’s smaller and more spatially efficient than the normal proteins that brain tissue is made out of, and the spread of these smaller proteins causes the tissue to shrink and literally grow holes. What I don’t understand is why the proteins in an infected brain “want” to copy the improper fold pattern – they aren’t sentient, they can’t notice the pattern and think “Why didn’t I try folding like this before, it’s so much more efficient”. If proteins “want” to fold a certain way because of a physical property, what was stopping them from folding that way in the first place? What is it about the introduction of a prion that makes healthy nerve tissue “get the idea” to fold that way?
In: Biology
They don’t. The prions get them to fold that way.
Proteins are the cell’s factories, they do nearly everything in the cell from moving around molecules to folding proteins to making energy.
A protein’s shape determines its function, and its construction from amino acids determine how the protein will get folded, among other things. Many environmental factors determine how a protein folds and this is an area of big research, as this isnt the only misfolded protein disease out there.
Most misfolded proteins do nothing. Some misfolded proteins do bad but its only one protein which can only do so much damage. The bigger misfolding diseases are caused by either mutation or a bad environment that causes mass misfolding.
Prions are unique, because **they misfold other proteins to take their form.** These misfolded proteins become the prions themselves, that then go along and misfold other proteins into their prion form, in other words they begin to spread and infect and interrupt regular operation of that protein.
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