Dynamics of proteins and amorphous solids and transport phenomena in proteins.

蛋白质在生物体中执行着广泛的任务，包括催化、电子、离子和小分子的运输、能量的转换和存储、信号转导等。蛋白质的多种可能的构象状态可以用能量景观的概念来描述。关于蛋白质能量景观上的障碍分布的信息对于更好地理解构象变化和折叠是必要的。这种信息可以通过高分辨率光学光谱等方法获得，因为嵌入蛋白质中的色素分子是对其环境的结构特性和动态非常敏感的探测器。我们还试图确定在光学实验中观察到的构象变化所涉及的实体的分子性质。

Proteins perform a broad variety of tasks in living organisms, including catalysis, transport of electrons, ions and small molecules, conversion and storage of energy, signal transduction, etc. The manifold of possible conformational states of a protein can be described using the concept of the energy landscape. Information on distributions of barriers on the protein energy landscapes is necessary to better understand conformational changes and folding. This information can be obtained by methods of high-resolution optical spectroscopy, among others, as pigment molecules embedded into protein serve as very sensitive probes to structural properties and dynamics of their environment. We also seek to determine the molecular nature of the entities involved in the conformational changes observed in optical experiments.