The cooperative nature of hydrophobic forces and protein folding kinetics

We study the effects of cooperative forces on protein folding kinetics using statistical energy landscape theory. We find that the mean first passage time for folding changes the shape from V to U-like curve dependence on the temperature when the effects of the cooperative forces are important, which is consistent with kinetic experiments. This supports the necessity for cooperative force. In addition, we find that cooperative forces tend to increase the free energy barrier so the kinetics is in general slower. Furthermore, we find that cooperative forces tend to suppress the fluctuations in kinetics more than non-cooperative forces. The cooperativity causes to the protein folding kinetics to be more two state-like.