Evolutionary origins of membrane proteins -- Molecular archeological studies of transmembrane transport systems -- Resource for structure related information on transmembrane proteins -- Topology prediction of membrane proteins: how distantly related homologs come into play -- Transmembrane beta-barrel protein structure prediction -- Multiple alignment of transmembrane protein sequences -- Prediction of re-entrant regions and other structural features beyond traditional topology models -- Dual-topology: one sequence, two topologies -- Predicting the burial/exposure status of transmembrane residues in helical membrane proteins -- Helix-helix interaction patt erns in membrane proteins -- Predicting residue and helix contacts in membrane proteins -- Natural constraints, folding, motion, and structural stability in transmembrane helical proteins -- Prediction of three-dimensional transmembrane helical protein structures -- GPCRs: past, present, and future.

This book is the first one specifically dedicated to the structural bioinformatics of membrane proteins. With a focus on membrane proteins from the perspective of bioinformatics, the present work covers a broad spectrum of topics in evolution, structure, function, and bioinformatics of membrane proteins focusing on the most recent experimental results. Leaders in the field who have recently reported breakthrough advances cover algorithms, databases and their applications to the subject. The increasing number of recently solved membrane protein structures makes the expert coverage presented here very timely. Structural bioinformatics of membrane proteins has been an active area of research over the last thee decades and proves to be a growing field of interest.