Mass spectrometry captures structural intermediates in protein fiber self-assembly.
Landreh M., Andersson M., Marklund EG., Jia Q., Meng Q., Johansson J., Robinson CV., Rising A.
Self-assembling proteins, the basis for a broad range of biological scaffolds, are challenging to study using most structural biology approaches. Here we show that mass spectrometry (MS) in combination with MD simulations captures structural features of short-lived oligomeric intermediates in spider silk formation, providing direct insights into its complex assembly process.