The kinesin walk: a dynamic model with elastically coupled heads

TL;DR

This paper introduces a simple, elastic coupling model for kinesin's stepping mechanism that accurately reproduces experimental transport properties without free parameters, aligning with ATPase pathway data.

Contribution

It presents a novel, robust model of kinesin movement with elastically coupled heads, fitting experimental data and explaining transport properties.

Findings

Model fits experimental data well

Zero load velocity varies with parameters

Consistent with ATPase pathway

Abstract

Recently individual two-headed kinesin molecules have been studied in in vitro motility assays revealing a number of their peculiar transport properties. In this paper we propose a simple and robust model for the kinesin stepping process with elastically coupled Brownian heads showing all of these properties. The analytic and numerical treatment of our model results in a very good fit to the experimental data and practically has no free parameters. Changing the values of the parameters in the restricted range allowed by the related experimental estimates has almost no effect on the shape of the curves and results mainly in a variation of the zero load velocity which can be directly fitted to the measured data. In addition, the model is consistent with the measured pathway of the kinesin ATPase.