Fumio Hirata – författare

In a living body, a variety of molecules are working in a concerted manner to maintain its life, and to carry forward the genetic information from generation to generation. A key word to understand such processes is "water," which plays an essential role in life phenomena. This book sheds light on life phenomena, which are woven by biomolecules as warp and water as weft, by means of statistical mechanics of molecular liquids, the RISM and 3D-RISM theories, both in equilibrium and non-equilibrium. A considerable number of pages are devoted to basics of mathematics and physics, so that students who have not majored in physics may be able to study the book by themselves. The book will also be helpful to those scientists seeking better tools for the computer-aided-drug-discovery.

In a living body, a variety of molecules are working in a concerted manner to maintain its life, and to carry forward the genetic information from generation to generation. A key word to understand such processes is "water," which plays an essential role in life phenomena. This book sheds light on life phenomena, which are woven by biomolecules as warp and water as weft, by means of statistical mechanics of molecular liquids, the RISM and 3D-RISM theories, both in equilibrium and non-equilibrium. A considerable number of pages are devoted to basics of mathematics and physics, so that students who have not majored in physics may be able to study the book by themselves. The book will also be helpful to those scientists seeking better tools for the computer-aided-drug-discovery.

Life is produced by the interplay of water and biomolecules. This book deals with the physicochemical aspects of such life phenomena produced by water and biomolecules, and addresses topics including "Protein Dynamics and Functions", "Protein and DNA Folding", and "Protein Amyloidosis". All sections have been written by internationally recognized front-line researchers. The idea for this book was born at the 5th International Symposium "Water and Biomolecules", held in Nara city, Japan, in 2008.

This book describes molecular processes taking place in living cells, in which “water” or “solvation” play essential roles. The molecular processes include conformational stability, fluctuation, relaxation, self-organization, molecular recognition, and chemical reactions. In all those processes, so-called solvation free-energy, and its first and second derivatives with respect to the atomic coordinates of biomolecules play key roles. Such derivatives of the free energy may not be calculated by any method of molecular simulation, because the calculation requires an analytical formula of the solvation free energy as a function of the atomic coordinates of a biomolecule. In this book, the theory is applied to analyze phenomena closely related to the conformational and density fluctuation of biomolecular systems, including the entropy and spectroscopy of both biomolecules and solvents. The theory is further developed to give microscopic expressions to the well-regarded phenomenological theories of chemical reactions, including the Michaelis–Menten theory of the enzymatic reaction, and the theory of the electron-transfer reaction by R. Marcus. Also clarified in the book is physical basis of Anfinsen’s hypothesis concerning the protein folding. This book is beneficial for graduate students and researchers in the field of life science and technology, especially for those studying pharmaceutical design and biomimetic technology such as artificial enzymes.