Summary
High-stability substructures fold first (1). In a series of protein folding MD simulations, individual helices that are most stable in the folded state are the first to form.
1.
Lindorff-Larsen K, Piana S, Dror RO, Shaw DE. How Fast-Folding Proteins Fold. Science. 2011;334(6055):517–20. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1208351