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2007
Wednesday, February 14, 2007 at 2:30 PM in MC 204
Crowded Cells and Molecular Machines
Raymond Kapral
Chemical Physics Theory Group
Department of Chemistry
University of Toronto
Abstract:
The cellular volume is crowded by structural elements such as
microtubules and filaments, various organelles and a variety of
other macromolecular species. The presence of these species
leads to molecular crowding which can modify the diffusive and reactive
dynamics of large and small molecules. Molecular machines are
nonequilibrium devices that perform regular motions in the presence of
strong noise to accomplish certain tasks. These machines operate in the
world of low Reynolds number hydrodynamics. Using particle-based models
of the dynamics, the influence of molecular crowding on transport, the role
of hydrodynamic interactions on molecular machine operation and the
effects of fluctuations in small spatially-distributed biochemical
networks will be described.