Professor Elizabeth Getzoff
Department of Molecular Biologyand and The Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology
The Scripps Research Institute
Unknown Location

Monday, April 19, 1999
3:00 pm (CT)
3269 Beckman Institute

Abstract

To understand in atomic detail how a chromophore and a protein interact to sense light and send a biological signal, we are pursuing coupled mutational, biochemical, spectroscopic, computational, and structural studies of the bacterial blue-light photoreceptor photoactive yellow protein (PYP). The three high resolution crystallographic structures that we have determined for intermediates in the photocycle of PYP reveal the interplay between protein and chromophore that mediates the conversion of light energy into a biological signal. Additionally, we have identified PYP as the structural prototype for the three-dimensional fold of the PAS domain superfamily, which encompasses diverse proteins primarily involved in signal-transduction pathways in all three kingdoms of life.

Tea and coffee will be served in R3151 Beckman Institute at 2:15pm.