A new study led by Northwestern University researchers, in collaboration with researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, found that tau vulnerable to misfolding carries a single dominant hotspot. That site binds to the matching site on a neighboring tau or on a tau at the end of an existing fibril, and the incoming tau then misfolds to match.
The hotspot is hydrated by water that wraps over and protects a hydrophobic site, and releasing that water pulls the two together.