CIRCULAR DICHROISM AND THE CONFORMATION OF PROTEINS

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The basic aim of our research is to determine the conformation of biopolymers using circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy and related techniques. CD is an excellent technique for monitoring the secondary structure of optically active biological molecules, since it is very sensitive to the orientation of nearest neighbor chromophores and since it can be used when these molecules are in solution. The conformation of biological molecules helps determine the reactions which they undergo, and thus we expect to learn about the relationships between the conformation of these molecules and their biological function. At the same time that we are investigating conformation, we are also trying to improve CD, both experimentally and theoretically so that it will be more useful. During the coming year, we will study the secondary structure of proteins of current interest. We will use the methods that we have developed in the past few years for extracting the secondary structures in a protein from its vacuum UV CD spectrum. We will collaborate with appropriate individuals to obtain exciting proteins. We plan to improve our techniques by adding a number of proteins to our basis set and extending the spectra of all proteins to 168 nm. We will also use our methods to investigate the denaturation of simple proteins to determine how the secondary structures come apart on denaturation.