The Zhong Group - Research - Conformation Dynamics

Biomolecular recognition and function often involve conformational changes such as local loop motions. These dynamics span a wide time range from femtosecond down to microsecond or millisecond. We are developing experimental methods to cover this wide time scale and probe the real-time conformation changes. Several resonance energy transfer pairs have been developed as a local probe to follow distance changes in conformational dynamics. We use one laser pulse (femtosecond or nanosecond) to perturb biological systems into a nonequilibrium state and then employ an fs pump-probe pulse pair, delayed in time, to gate the conformational changes using various schemes such as electron transfer and resonance energy transfer. This methodology opens new frontiers in biological conformation dynamics. Currently we focus on heme proteins and DNA polymerases.