MSMPathfinder: Identification of Pathways in Markov State Models.

ABSTRACT

Markov state models represent a popular means to interpret biomolecular processes in terms of memoryless transitions between metastable conformational states. To gain insight into the underlying mechanism, it is instructive to determine all relevant pathways between initial and final states of the process. Currently available methods, such as Markov chain Monte Carlo and transition path theory, are convenient for identifying the most frequented pathways. They are less suited to account for the typically huge amount of pathways with low probability which, though, may dominate the cumulative flux of the reaction. On the basis of a systematic construction of all possible pathways, the here proposed method MSMPathfinder is able to characterize the multitude of unique pathways (say, up to 1010) in a complex system and to quantitatively calculate their correct weights and associated waiting times with predefined accuracy. Adopting the chiral transitions of a peptide helix and the folding of the villin headpiece as model problems, mechanisms and associated waiting times of these processes are discussed using a kinetic network representation. The analysis reveals that the waiting time distribution may yield only little insight into the diversity of pathways, because the measured folding times do typically not reflect the most probable path lengths but rather the cumulative effect of many different pathways.