Theoretical and simulation studies on voltage-gated sodium channels

Abstract

Voltage-gated sodium (Na_v) channels are indispensable membrane elements for the generation and propagation of electric signals in excitable cells. The successes in the crystallographic studies on prokaryotic Na_v channels in recent years greatly promote the mechanistic investigation of these proteins and their eukaryotic counterparts. In this paper, we mainly review the progress in computational studies, especially the simulation studies, on these proteins in the past years.

Key words： voltage-gated sodium channels; molecular dynamics simulation; ion permeation; ion selectivity; voltage gating

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