Abstract
The behavior of the eye-lens protein bovine γB-crystallin is investigated at both room temperature and at an elevated temperature (at which unfolding would be expected to occur) using molecular dynamics. Even in the high temperature simulation, there is little loss ·of secondary structure. Although only small changes in the tertiary contacts occur, even at high temperature, fluctuations in conformation are much more pronounced at 500K than 300K. These results agree with the experimental observations on the remarkable stability of the eye lens proteins and also indicate where the initial events in unfolding are occurring.