Proposed sequence of events for GroEL encapsulation, based upon results from the present study.

In this figure, ideas derived from the present study are illustrated in yellow text bubbles, ideas based upon prior studies [20]–[22] are illustrated in the blue text bubble. The scheme is based on the characteristics displayed by numerous mutant forms of GroEL that highlight certain dependencies between individual molecular events. Kinetic phases detected in our stopped-flow experiments are indicated in blue text, names of individual mutants are denoted in red text, and green text indicates proposed correlations and conclusions derived from comparisons of our results with various previous studies. Details are given in the main text.