Join us for MLS Seminar featuring Dr. Siegfried Musser, Professor of Cell Biology and Genetics at Texas A&M University! The title of his talk is Single molecules, super-resolution, nuclear pores, and condensates.
The Musser Lab is primarily a biophysics lab that focuses on deciphering molecular mechanisms and dynamics via single molecule fluorescence (SMF) microscopy and particle tracking approaches. Most diffusing molecules move hundreds of nanometers in milliseconds, even in the complex milieu of a cell. Thus, the partitioning of proteins into various compartments is limited primarily by their interactions with encountered molecules rather than via inherent diffusive limits on molecular motion. For protein translocation systems, their goal is to decipher the rules for the sets of interactions required to migrate through a conduit (pore) within a lipid bilayer. For condensates, their goal is identify changes the physical properties and sub-structural elements that are present in distinct phase states. The current spatial precision of SMF approaches is in the single digit nanometer range at ~1 kHz (millisecond time resolution), providing a powerful tool to address both structural as well as dynamical questions.
