中国生物工程杂志

The newly-synthesized protein must fold into its proper three-dimensional structure to be useful to the cell, in many situations efficient folding of many newly synthesized proteins depends on assistance from molecular chaperones, which serve to prevent protein misfolding and degradation in the crowded environment of the cell. In this article, at first we discuss the concept and classification of molecular chaperones, next describe several new hypothesises about how protein folds, and lastly use Hsp70 and Hsp90 as examples introducing the latest research progress on the function of molecular chaperones in facilitating protein folding.