简介

What are the structural dynamics involved in protein allostery and catalysis? How do flexible enzymes perform challenging chemistry? Can we animate crystal structures of proteins? These are outstanding questions in biology, which motivate studies of proteins in motion. Capturing molecular movies of proteins in action is the next frontier of structural enzymology. Towards this goal, our group will develop advanced X-ray based methods, such as time-resolved X-ray scattering, in order to examine the role of structural dynamics in enzyme function at multiple length- and timescales. Enzymes that utilize metal-containing cofactors (i.e. metalloenzymes) are of particular interest to our research, both for the fascinating reactions that they are able to catalyze and for their physical properties. In addition to performing biochemical and biophysical characterizations in-house, our group will design and fabricate devices and heavily utilize synchrotron X-rays.