On 11/23/17 11:20 AM, ZHANG Cheng wrote:
Dear Gromacs,
When I calculate the RMSD for the whole protein, I got values mostly from 
0.2-0.5 nm. However, when I only calculate for a particular residue (using an 
index file), the scale is mostly only 0.01-0.02 nm, even for a residue on the 
loop.


My understanding is: when doing the RMSD, the software will align the selected 
group to the group in the reference, as much as possible. Then the software 
calculates the root mean square deviation.


As a result, though a protein may deviate a lot from its reference structure, 
if only one residue is selected for RMSD, the relative positions of the atoms 
within that residue still remain almost the same relative coordination, which 
makes their RMSD only 0.01-0.02 nm.


Can I ask if my understanding is correct?

Yes, but note that fitting a residue to itself is practically useless (as you are seeing with your inconsequential residue RMSD values); one would more often fit to the whole protein (or backbone, CA, etc) and subsequently calculate the RMSD of a given residue if its changes are of interest.


I wonder, if I can write some script (e.g. python) to manually extract the 
coordinates information from various frames in the xtc/trr file?

Sure, but you can also do that with gmx traj -ox.

-Justin

--
==================================================

Justin A. Lemkul, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Virginia Tech Department of Biochemistry

303 Engel Hall
340 West Campus Dr.
Blacksburg, VA 24061

jalem...@vt.edu | (540) 231-3129
http://www.biochem.vt.edu/people/faculty/JustinLemkul.html

==================================================

--
Gromacs Users mailing list

* Please search the archive at 
http://www.gromacs.org/Support/Mailing_Lists/GMX-Users_List before posting!

* Can't post? Read http://www.gromacs.org/Support/Mailing_Lists

* For (un)subscribe requests visit
https://maillist.sys.kth.se/mailman/listinfo/gromacs.org_gmx-users or send a 
mail to gmx-users-requ...@gromacs.org.

Reply via email to