Question

Which of the following is untrue about Grid Representation?

(a) To speed up the matching process the topology of the protein can be simplified from atomic level detail to a series of cubic elements

(b) To speed up the matching process discretizing the 3-dimensional space using a grid is done

(c) Discretizing allows very fast computer matching using search methods such as Fourier transform

(d) Fourier transform is hardly used in computer matching

The question was posed to me in an international level competition.

This intriguing question originated from Molecular Complementarity topic in chapter Predicting the Structure of Protein – Biomolecular Interactions of Bioinformatics

Answer 1

The correct choice is (d) Fourier transform is hardly used in computer matching

Explanation: The shape of a molecule is described by mapping it to a 3-D grid of uniformly spaced points. Clearly the level of detail is controlled by the grid spacing. The larger the grid spacing the cruder the representation with respect to the atomic level.