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SUMMARY:Lipids as Co-solvents: Spectroscopic Approaches for Lipid-protein I
 nteractions
LOCATION:Chemistry A101
TZID:America/Denver
DTSTART:20250925T160000
UID:2026-04-25-13-12-29@natsci.colostate.edu
DTSTAMP:20260425T131229
Description:About the Seminar:\n\nProteins operate within an aqueous enviro
 nment that influences their folding\, stability\, and activity. Membrane p
 roteins have the added complication of being embedded in lipid bilayers th
 at play an equally critical\, yet significantly less understood\, role. Mu
 ch like solvent conditions modulate enzyme kinetics and protein interactio
 ns in solution\, the lipid composition of the membrane performs regulatory
  functions for membrane proteins\, affecting their organization\, conforma
 tional dynamics\, and catalytic output. To investigate these membrane-depe
 ndent phenomena\, we employ time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy techni
 ques like pulsed interleaved excitation fluorescence cross-correlation spe
 ctroscopy (PIE-FCCS) in model membranes and live cells. We couple these sp
 ectroscopic probes with liposome-based activity assays in vitro. These com
 plementary approaches allow us to quantitatively assess how specific lipid
  species influence the assembly and function of receptor tyrosine kinases 
 (RTKs). By drawing parallels to the well-established influence of solvent 
 on soluble proteins\, our work centers the membrane environment as a dynam
 ic and tunable component of cell signaling.\n\nAbout the speaker:\n\n\nAda
 m W. Smith was born in Texas and grew up in Utah. He was an undergraduate 
 at the University of Utah and then earned a PhD at MIT in the lab of Andre
 i Tokmakoff studying peptide and protein folding with 2D IR spectroscopy. 
 From 2008-2011 he was a postdoctoral researcher with Jay T. Groves at UC B
 erkeley\, where he studied membrane protein structure and function with ad
 vanced fluorescence imaging and spectroscopy. In 2012\, Adam was a visitin
 g scientist at the National University of Singapore and Lawrence Berkeley 
 National Laboratory. He joined the faculty at the University of Akron from
  2012-2022 and then moved to Texas Tech University where he is currently a
 n Associate Professor of Chemistry. 4:00 pm
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