An international team has developed a model that simulates protein evolution. Starting from stiff, unfunctional proteins, the computer model shows how evolving protein components can work together to give rise to dynamic and efficient molecular machines. Flexibility allows proteins to change their 3D conformation to bind other molecules: this property is crucial to their function. Prof. Tsvi Tlusty and Dr. Sandipan Dutta at the Center for Soft and Living Matter, within the Institute for Basic Science (IBS, South Korea), in collaboration with Prof. Albert Libchaber from Rockefeller University and Prof. Jean-Pierre Eckmann from University of Geneva have mimicked gene evolution to obtain proteins that can bend and bind to other molecules. Understanding of this relation is one of the most highly sought-after aspects of protein biology; it could help to explain pharmaceutical action of drugs binding to their targets.