Moulding fluorescent proteins into biotools: engineering topology, surfaces and chromophores

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Proteins are amazing molecular machines that are essential for Life as we know it. After a century of protein research, we now have a very good understanding of how proteins are able to carry out their vast array of functions. One extraordinarily useful family of proteins, which we now understand quite well, is the family of intrinsically fluorescent proteins (FPs) that includes the green FP from Aequorea jellyfish and its numerous homologues of various color from coral. FPs have the unique (among proteins) ability to generate a visible wavelength fluorophore within their own 3-dimensional structure and thus can absorb visible light and reemit it as a red-shifted hue. In the past decade, these remarkable protein tools have enabled many exciting advances in biological research because genetically inserting a FP into a living cell or tissue allows one to 'see' biological structures that would otherwise be undetectable. FPs are credited with sparking the explosive and continuing growth in the popularity of live cell fluorescence microscopy; culminating in the awarding of 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry to the pioneers of FP research.