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UNIVERSITY OF BUCHAREST
FACULTY OF PHYSICS Guest
2024-11-24 21:13 |
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Conference: Bucharest University Faculty of Physics 2015 Meeting
Section: Biophysics; Medical Physics
Title:
SINGLE MOLECULE BIOPHYSICS: A FRUITFUL TREND IN BIOPHYSICAL RESEARCH
Authors:
Claudia G. CHILOM, Marcela E. BARBINTA-PATRASCU, Doina M. GĂZDARU,
Aurel I. POPESCU
Affiliation:
Department of Electricity, Solid Physics and Biophysics, Faculty of Physics,
University of Bucharest, ROMANIA
E-mail
prof.aurel.popescu@gmail.com
Keywords:
Protein folding, DNA winding, magnetic tweezers, optical tweezers, fluorescence detection
Abstract:
In the last decades, the scientific community has assisted to the birth and rapid consolidation of a new and promising branch of biophysics: single-molecule biophysics (SMB). In contrast with conventional experiments approaching simultaneously a great number of molecules, for which the average properties are measured, the single-molecule biophysics is dealing with structure, dynamics, and function of individual macromolecules (i.e., free of interactions with other molecules, excepting water as a solvent). Thus, some peculiar molecular properties hidden by averaging over molecular ensembles are revealed by the biophysical single-molecule techniques. At least two reasons make SMB powerful for the study of complex biophysical systems: a) molecular properties are measured one molecule at a time, this single-molecule experiment permitting more directly the measurement of the molecular properties, b) dynamics of the systems are measured under equilibrium conditions for single molecules; this aspect is important for the dynamics that cannot be easily synchronized (e.g., the motions of the molecular motors along their tracks are not synchronized for significant distances). The main experimental techniques and methodologies used by SMB could be classified as: techniques to monitor and manipulate individual biomolecules (e.g., fluorescence detection, atomic force microscopy, optical and magnetic tweezers), techniques in super-resolution and functional imaging, studies of physical properties of biomolecules (folding, biophysics of proteins/DNA/RNAs), and integration methodes of SMB and nanoscience.
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