Asymmetry of amyloid fibrils: Molecular Dynamics Simulations

Alzheimer’s disease, one of dementia, is caused by amyloid fibrils of amyloid-β (Aβ) peptides. It has been known that the Aβ amyloid fibrils extend only in one direction, but the reason has not been clarified. We found that the structure and fluctuation of the Aβ amyloid fibrils differ between the right and left ends by molecular dynamics simulations and clarified that this is the reason for the unidirectionality of the amyloid-fibril elongation. This result will be applied to develop inhibitors for the causative substance of the Alzheimer's disease.

H. Okumura and S. G. Itoh, Sci. Rep. 6 (2016) 38422 (9 pages).