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Record W4416716428 · doi:10.1021/acsomega.5c05830

Can Prions Carry Biological Information?

2025· article· en· W4416716428 on OpenAlexaff
Kariem Ezzat, Alberto J. Espay

Bibliographic record

VenueACS Omega · 2025
Typearticle
Languageen
FieldBiochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
TopicPrion Diseases and Protein Misfolding
Canadian institutionsCentre for Movement Disorders
Fundersnot available
KeywordsTranslation (biology)Folding (DSP implementation)Protein foldingPrion proteinCarry (investment)Extension (predicate logic)

Abstract

fetched live from OpenAlex

The discovery of the structure of DNA and the elucidation of the molecular mechanisms of replication, transcription, and translation are the foundations of modern biology and medicine. However, in the early 80s, the prion hypothesis introduced a new system of biological information transfer that does not rely on DNA; it introduced the concept of conformational propagation through templating. Unlike the molecular biology revolution, which was based on detailed molecular structures and mechanisms, the prion hypothesis was postulated in the absence of clear molecular structures or mechanisms. In this Viewpoint, we highlight 10 points in which the prion hypothesis contradicts the molecular, structural, and mechanistic experimental evidence accrued since its inception four decades ago. Alternatively, we postulate that an extension of the thermodynamic hypothesis of protein folding (Anfinsen's dogma) to the state of proteins at high concentration (supersaturation) is better suited for explaining the different facets and pathways of protein aggregation.

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.

How this classification was reachedexpand

Full frame machine prediction

Teacher imitation

Not calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.

metaresearch head score (Codex)0.004
metaresearch head score (Gemma)0.011
Version: metacan-v3-hybrid-931329e0061cValidation status: machine_predicted_unvalidated
Candidate categoriesnone
Consensus categoriesnone
DomainCandidate signal: none · Consensus signal: none
Study designCandidate signal: Theoretical or conceptual · Consensus signal: Theoretical or conceptual
GenreCandidate signal: Empirical · Consensus signal: none
Teacher disagreement score0.006
Threshold uncertainty score0.019

Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)

CategoryCodexGemma
Metaresearch0.0040.011
Meta-epidemiology (narrow)0.0010.001
Meta-epidemiology (broad)0.0020.001
Bibliometrics0.0020.001
Science and technology studies0.0020.014
Scholarly communication0.0060.016
Open science0.0020.002
Research integrity0.0050.003
Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)0.0030.003

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.

Opus teacher head0.008
GPT teacher head0.253
Teacher spread0.246 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work
Validation statusscore_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Classification

machine, unvalidated

Machine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.

The models applied no category: nothing in the taxonomy fit this work.
Study designTheoretical or conceptual
Domainnot available
GenreEmpirical

How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".

Quick stats

Citations0
Published2025
Admission routes1
Has abstractyes

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