Micromechanical study of DNA-protein interactions and chromosome structure

Speaker: John Marko, Department of Physics and Astronomy and Department of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and Cell Biology, Northwestern University

When: April 17, 2007 (Tue), 03:15PM to 05:00PM (add to my calendar)
Hosted by: Rama Bansil

This event is part of the Physics Department Colloquia Series.

I will discuss the use of micromechanical assays – essentially measurements of elasticity – as methods to study how DNA is organized by being folded by proteins, ultimately into whole chromosomes. I will discuss studies at three scales of complexity. First, I will present results of single-DNA micromanipulation studies of proteins which compact the chromosome in the bacterium E. coli. Next, I will show how similar techniques can be applied to the study of the dynamics of assembly of chromatin fiber onto a single DNA molecule. Finally I will discuss experiments which probe the internal organization of chromosomes isolated from dividing cells.