This CAREER award by the Analytical and Surface Chemistry program supports work by Professor Ryan Julian at the University of California - Riverside to develop faster methods for proteomics - the identification of proteins in a given cell or environment. Proteins are the biological agents which carry out virtually all chemistry in living organisms. Identifying all proteins present is often one of the first steps towards obtaining a detailed understanding of a biochemical process. Rapid identification is difficult because there are often thousands of proteins involved in complex functional relationships in a given site. Professor Julian and his group utilize a novel combination of mass spectrometry and laser induced photodissociation to facilitate identification. The information obtained from these experiments can uniquely identify a protein in a fraction of a second.
This research simultaneously serves many educational purposes, including the training of graduate, postgraduate, and undergraduate researchers in the important and growing field of biological mass spectrometry. Related outreach activities catering to the specific needs of the diverse student body at UC-Riverside include a program for the formal mentoring of science undergraduates on campus with an emphasis on helping underrepresented groups and student-athletes. A new graduate course is being created to enhance student knowledge of chemical and noncovalent bonds and to emphasize the importance of connections between all fields of chemistry.
The electrons that bond atoms together to form molecules are typically found in pairs of two, which increases the stability of the electrons. In some situations, lone electrons can be produced, which are referred to more commonly as radicals or free radicals. Radicals are usually reactive species, which seek to form or break new bonds for greater stability. In biology, radicals are very important. They can cause damage to virtually all biological molecules, including DNA, which is likely the reason that they are used by the immune system for defense. In an uncontrolled context, radical production is associated with many diseases, including cancer. Simultaneously, radicals have unexpected beneficial uses in biology, such as their use in signaling. For example, erectile dysfunction is primarily caused by a deficiency in production of a radical signaling molecule. This award enabled mass spectrometric investigations (experiments where molecules are essentially weighed) of radical peptides and proteins in the gas phase. There are both practical and fundamental outcomes of this research. For example, we have been able to examine the fundamental nature of radical chemistry in peptides and proteins, which is of fundamental importance to biology as described above. In addition, the radical chemistry can be used to extract additional desirable information about peptides and proteins, such as how they are modified, what are their three dimensional structures, how do they interact with other molecules, etc. In these experiments, we have used the radical as a tool to extract the desired information. This information will provide the foundation for enhancing our understanding of biology, which is critical for future progress in the related field of medicine. The results from this research have been disseminated in ~30 publications and via oral and poster presentations at dozens of conferences. Training for more than 20 postdoctoral, graduate, and undergraduate students has been an integral part of carrying out this research. These students will go on to use these skills to benefit society in many ways.
