Crowding and the polymerization of sickle hemoglobin

Under physiological conditions, sickle hemoglobin, a natural mutant of human hemoglobin A with a surface hydrophobic valine in place of a negatively charged glutamic acid, polymerizes at high volume occupancy. Equilibrium solubility of sickle hemoglobin entails activity coefficients that can approach 10 3 at high concentrations. Polymerization occurs by homogeneous and heterogeneous nucleation mechanisms, which are both profoundly sensitive to crowding; homogeneous nucleation rates for example are enhanced by 10 10 when the initial concentration is augmented by 50% non‐polymerizing hemoglobin. A molecular description of the reaction therefore entails substantial corrections for molecular crowding which are all very accurately described by excluded volume corrections, treating hemoglobin as a hard sphere with volume consistent with the molecular structure of the molecule, and involving no further adjustable parameters. These effects and the descriptions that rationalize this behavior are described. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.