Wait I thought protein folding was “solved”? Is it just significantly improved or was I lied to?
Protein folding is not solved yet
Submitted 6 days ago by ranzispa@mander.xyz to science_memes@mander.xyz
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Comments
sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 6 days ago
ranzispa@mander.xyz 6 days ago
Not solved, no. Definitely much much better than before. The difference AlphaFold made is significant: we’re talking about getting a decent model in a couple minutes using a PC compared to several months of calculations before.
However we still need experimental data: in many occasions AlphaFold gives an incorrect model. With some experimental data that model can be improved, but we still have no reliable way to know what the structure of a protein is starting from the amino acidic sequence without extensive experimentation.
That’s the big promise of quantum computers, there are however two major problems in my opinion:
- There’s still no theoretical framework which explains how once we have a quantum computer we may tackle protein folding
- Plenty quantum computing companies closed shortly after AlphaFold was published since they lost all funding because protein folding was “solved”
MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 6 days ago
90% of quantum computing is a hype scam anyway.
MarcomachtKuchen@feddit.org 6 days ago
That’s really intereting. Thank you for the informative comment.
I once did a internship where we solved protein structures by using Cristalisation and X-ray fracturing. Is this what you’re referring to with extensive research or has the methodology advanced?
sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 6 days ago
Thank you ❤️
quediuspayu@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 days ago
Didn’t google shut down alphafold recently?
Midnitte@beehaw.org 6 days ago
We traded it in for something that will hallucinate a solution.
ranzispa@mander.xyz 6 days ago
AlphaFold is incorrect in plenty occasions.
sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 6 days ago
Ah, yes I can imagine that being the case
Piemanding@sh.itjust.works 6 days ago
How do you solve protein folding when there are so many different ways for proteins to arrange?
sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 6 days ago
A reliable way to simulate any kind of protein fold. As long as you have a method you could hypothetically “solve” the issue
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 6 days ago
There actually aren’t. However, some of the most interesting proteins have no structure at all.
Kolanaki@pawb.social 6 days ago
Question: Is folding protien like folding paper, and you can only get 11 creases in it? 🤔
LetThereBeNick@lemmy.zip 3 days ago
It’s a lot more like smushing a shoestring into a tangled ball
ICastFist@programming.dev 6 days ago
My mind thought about this ancient meme about katanas and how they’re folded 1000 times
HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Maybe samurai just needed bigger pockets
DeathsEmbrace@lemmy.world 6 days ago
A billion summations and multiplications. You can fight me over this.
Conclusionallusion@sh.itjust.works 6 days ago
But like… the helium gets all wavy man…
LurkingLuddite@piefed.social 6 days ago
I mean… modern CPUs can do multiple billions of summations and multiplications in a single second (let alone GPUs), and yet protein folding can take a long time.
A quantum computer is MUCH faster for finding viable solutions, though they’re MUCH harder to set up even for individual problems, and still need verification of the results.
ranzispa@mander.xyz 6 days ago
I did not yet see a single quantum algorithm able to tackle the protein folding problem.
Sure, quantum computers could be faster at solving graph related problems, but I did not see an approach able to reduce protein folding to a graph problem.
On the other hand neural networks have been successfully applied to the protein folding problem, and they do that quite quickly.
Not a perfect solution indeed, quantum computers may be much better at that; but I still do not see a theoretical framework which justifies claims as to the applicability of quantum computers to the protein folding problem.
heartSagan5@lemmy.zip 6 days ago
Why are we protein folding? The largest quantum computer — the Universe — already solved it because we’re standing.
lefaucet@slrpnk.net 5 days ago
Agreed, tho to clarify, gonna need more than a billion. Like Alpha Fold is the closest I’ve read about… Dunno how many summations and multiplications it is, but I know it’s more than a billion
But I’m convinced configuring a quantum computer with enough qbits to solve it is just going to be so much more difficult than throwing few quintillion more billion summations and multiplications.