| Project Detail |
Protein structures, including their complexes, determine their specific function and the molecular working mechanisms. The astonishing developments in X-ray crystallography and cryo-EM allow insights into atomic levels of protein structures, however, commonly on their static, solid state conformations. Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and single molecule fluorescence spectroscopy, on the other hand, allow observations of protein dynamics in solution, in real-time. In particular, specific intermediate and long-range interactions can be measured using paramagnetic resonance enhancements (PRE) or single molecule Förster Resonance Energy Transfer (smFRET), requiring site-specific labelling with paramagnetic or fluorescence probes, respectively. Naturally, the choice of the label and its covalent attachment to the protein are critical, however, traditional approaches rely on random cysteine labelling with only a handful of available probes, making measurements difficult to interpret and laborious. As such, there is an urgent demand to develop custom-tailored, selective, orthogonal, easy to use chemical biology probes with excellent spectroscopic properties (for smFRET and PRE) to drive the field of protein structure and dynamics. This proposal tackles current limitations in the peptide/protein labelling field by creating state-of-the-art fluorophores for red/far-red smFRET. Building on this, the best performing dyes will be unleashed to defined labelling of intrinsically disordered and native proteins, in vitro and in cellulo, respectively. Next, these concepts will be expanded to be merged with intramolecular PRE probes to combine to date mutually exclusive spectroscopic properties. InProSpecT (Innovative Protein labelling strategies for Spectroscopic high resolution Techniques) pushes a bottom-up approach, from fluorophore design and labelling strategies ultimately linking two worlds to allow unprecedented, simultaneous studies of protein distances and dynamics. |
