Welcome to the Foldit group page for CHEN 3801 Pharmaceutical Biotechnology (Fall 2014)! The objective of the use of Foldit in this course is to introduce fundamental concepts of protein structure and folding, which are inherently important in producing therapeutic proteins. Through the use of Foldit, you will specifically learn the role of sidechain interactions and sterics, backbone packing, hydrogen bonding, and hydrophobic interactions in the rearrangement of polypeptide chains into complex three dimensional structures. Playing Foldit, you will be presented with various puzzles in which you will be tasked with optimizing the structure of the unfolded protein. This will be done through determining the highest-scoring (i.e., lowest energy) model of the structure of the protein in each puzzle. Ultimately, what you learn in the process of playing Foldit is critical to understanding the structure and stability of therapeutic proteins.