Seminar “A droplet-microfluidic high-throughput approach to helicase biophysics”
Date
Tuesday, 15th of March of 2016
Time
12:00 am
Place
University of Barcelona
Faculty of Physics Building
Room 3.20, 3rd floor
Speaker
Dr Marco Ribezzi-Crivellari, Laboratoire de Biochimie (LBC) – ESPCI (France)
Abstract
Current approaches to molecular motors struggle to bridge the high-resolution crystal structure to the dynamic picture obtained in single-molecule experiments. Closing this gap amounts to identifying the relevant degrees of freedom which control the action of the motor. We propose a novel experimental approach to this problem. Using ultrahigh-throughput droplet microfluidic techniques we are trying to perform a biochemical characterization of all the single point mutants (n~105) of a molecular motor model, the RecQ helicase from Escherichia coli. This will give us a comprehensive mapping of the kinetic parameters of the motor on its sequence. The relevant degrees of freedom will be identified as those positions along the sequence where mutations have the larger impact on kinetic parameters. This will allow us to clarify the translocation mechanism and to refine the theoretical understanding on the design principles of molecular motors.
