The broader goal of this research is to understand how crowding and the weak association of proteins in the live cell is used by cells to control its proteins. This project makes connection with many areas in physics, chemistry and cell biology. Thus, the undergraduate and graduate students supported by this research project come from many scientific backgrounds, and will acquire the knowledge and hands-on skills to advance US chemical technology and teaching in the area of molecular and cellular biophysics. Special efforts will also be made to disseminate the instrumentation technology resulting from this project, and create strong ties to researchers in the US and abroad. Thus the project will have impacts in biotechnology and instrumentation industry.
The objective of this research project is to look inside single cells to see how their crowded environment affects the proteins and nucleic acids that keep the cell alive. Specific tasks are to find out how protein folding and movement inside cells interact, how the cell cycle controls protein folding, and how components of the spliceosome form inside cells from proteins and nucleic acids. The spliceosome cuts and rejoins our DNA so messenger RNA can be manufactured for making proteins. Humans could not live without it, yet we know virtually nothing about the biophysics of how its many protein and RNA pieces are assembled to do the job. As a final important task, the PI will look at an important industrial method that borrows the crowding idea from cells. So-called "PEGylation" enhances protein longevity by decorating proteins with stabilizing polymers, but the biophysical mechanism of stabilization remains unknown.
