A coarse-grained xDLVO model for colloidal protein–protein interactions

Abstract

Colloidal protein–protein interactions (PPIs) of attractive and repulsive nature modulate the solubility of proteins, their aggregation, precipitation and crystallization. Such interactions are very important for many biotechnological processes, but are complex and hard to control, therefore, difficult to be understood in terms of measurements alone. In diluted protein solutions, PPIs can be estimated from the osmotic second virial coefficient, B₂₂, which has been calculated using different methods and levels of theory. The most popular approach is based on the Derjaguin–Landau–Verwey–Overbeek (DLVO) theory and its extended versions, i.e. xDLVO. Despite much efforts, these models are not fully quantitative and must be fitted to experiments, which limits their predictive value. Here, we report an extended xDLVO-CG model, which extends existing models by a coarse-grained representation of proteins and the inclusion of an additional ion–protein dispersion interaction term. We demonstrate for four proteins, i.e. lysozyme (LYZ), subtilisin (Subs), bovine serum albumin (BSA) and immunoglobulin (IgG1), that semi-quantitative agreement with experimental values without the need to fit to experimental B₂₂ values. While most likely not the final step in the nearly hundred years of research in PPIs, xDLVO-CG is a step towards predictive PPIs calculations that are transferable to different proteins.