System for Resolving Native Membrane Nanodiscs and Protein Assemblies

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This proposal requests funding to purchase a state-of-the-art system for separating biologically intact macromolecular complexes and elucidating their oligomeric states, stoichiometries and polydispersities. The complexes are derived from natural sources including raw membrane from plants, fungi and animal sources, whole cells and tissues, and consist of multiple proteins, lipid species and amphipathic polymers which have been designed for spontaneous release into nanoparticles between 5 and 20 nm. This overcomes the limitations of conventional detergents and allows unstable, labile and rare complexes to be produced cost effectively and studied in native states, and offers a step-change for molecular and structural biology research as well as applications in biotechnology, defense, energy and pharmaceutical industries.