Viscoelastic Transition and Yield Strain of the Folded Protein

For proteins, the mechanical properties of the folded state are directly related to function, which generally entails conformational motion. Through sub-Angstrom resolution measurements of the AC mechanical susceptibility of a globular protein we describe a new fundamental materials property of the folded state. For increasing amplitude of the forcing, there is a reversible transition from elastic to viscoelastic response. At fixed frequency, the amplitude of the deformation is piecewise linear in the force, with different slopes in the elastic and viscoelastic regimes. Effectively, the protein softens beyond a yield point defined by this transition. We propose that ligand induced conformational changes generally operate in this viscoelastic regime, and that this is a universal property of the folded state.