Title:

Single-molecule studies of Kinesin and the ClpXP motors

Speaker:

Dr. Matthew Lang

Affiliation:

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massaachusetts

When:

Tuesday, January 26, 2010 at 11:00:00 AM   Add to Calendar

Where:

MRDC Building, Room 4211

Host:

Andres Garcia
andres.garcia@me.gatech.edu
404-894-9384

Abstract

A general introduction to single molecule methods applied to molecular and cellular systems will be presented followed by detailed studies of two molecular motors, kinesin which transports cargo and ClpXP which recognizes proteins, mechanically unfolds, transports and degrades them. Force generation in the kinesin motor protein is driven by folding between the N-terminal cover strand and neck linker to form the cover neck bundle, a mechanism that is directly tested by optical trapping measurements of engineered kinesin motor mutants. The ClpXP protease, a member of the AAA+ class of motors, destroys protein substrates by coordinating machinery for recognition, denaturation, translocation and degradation, events which are measured a new single-molecule fluorescence assay using a series of fluorescently labeled GFP based substrates.