Is sanity linked to the desire to conform?
In insane/crazy are those with dramatically different ways of thinking that make them either unable to operate with majority society, or cause them to be ostracized to the extent which they become confined to the fringe.
Without a reasonable amount of conformity, society would never have been able to expand to support so many people. No immediate judgement on whether this has been a good or bad thing.
Only those who think outside of the box can come up with 'new' ideas, which drive our technology and cultural evolution. Pure conformists would cause total stagnation, while pure insanists would cause total destruction.
Where are you on the sliding scale?
1/07/2012
1/03/2012
HIV protease protein sequence alignment
For fun and curiosity, I pulled the peptide sequences of all the HIV protease entries on Uniprot, and aligned them using Vector NTI.
The HIV protease is essential for HIV particle maturation, and hence the virus life cycle. If one could design or isolate a small molecule that could specifically inhibit the protease, it should greatly decrease the spread of HIV.
It is important to note that a specific protease inhibitor would drive selection for a variant protease sequence that is not inhibited by the small molecule.
Hence, by aligning the known protease sequences, we can begin to identify the sequence in the protease that is most flexible/amenable to variation, as well as identify the conserved residues that are likely important for the protein's overall structure and function.
Perhaps a cocktail of small molecules that inhibit all possible isoforms in the HIV protease sequence space would be effective at putting the breaks on HIV spread.
Screen/dream away.
The HIV protease is essential for HIV particle maturation, and hence the virus life cycle. If one could design or isolate a small molecule that could specifically inhibit the protease, it should greatly decrease the spread of HIV.
It is important to note that a specific protease inhibitor would drive selection for a variant protease sequence that is not inhibited by the small molecule.
Hence, by aligning the known protease sequences, we can begin to identify the sequence in the protease that is most flexible/amenable to variation, as well as identify the conserved residues that are likely important for the protein's overall structure and function.
Perhaps a cocktail of small molecules that inhibit all possible isoforms in the HIV protease sequence space would be effective at putting the breaks on HIV spread.
Screen/dream away.
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