Recent advances in UV resonance Raman spectroscopy have demonstrated its unique power to examine biomolecular structure and dynamics. The spectra are very sensitive to molecular geometry due to the dependence of the normal mode frequencies on bond lengths and bond angles. The UV Raman spectra detail both static and dynamic structural changes. The information content of UVRR spectroscopy is presently limited by spectrometer throughput, since modern deep UV laser sources provide higher powers than can be utilized for resonance Raman excitation. The excitation intensity threshold is limited by the onset of nonlinear optical processes. We will develop a novel deep UV Raman spectrometer with dramatically improved sensitivity and signal-to-noise ratios to enable incisive investigations of biological structure and function. This spectrometer will be targeted for determining protein and peptide secondary structure and for kinetic studies which examine the dynamics of protein folding. The work proposed here will revolutionize UVRR measurements by developing a new spectrometer which will collect much more Raman scattered light than previous instruments.
Major advances in the understanding of biomolecular structure and function result from the development of more incisive methods to visualize molecular structure and dynamics. An increased understanding of biomolecular structure and function directly leads to insight into human health and is essential for developing methods to treat human disease. The resulting more powerful UV Raman instrumentation will give new insights into the mechanism(s) of protein folding, which is arguably the most important outstanding problem in enzymology.
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