Protein Nucleic Acid Interactions MIC/BIO 522
Description of CourseThe interaction between proteins and nucleic acids is critical to all organisms both cellular and viral. The interaction between proteins and nucleic acids from a physical biochemical perspective will be studied. There will be significant required reading and this will be available as handouts. The format for the class (M/W/F) will consist of two lectures per week and one discussion/presentation session. These presentations will be done by students. Students will also be assigned homework problems and there will be a final exam as well. Students will be graded on the homework, final exam and presentations. Registration by permission of instructors
Course Rationale & Goals
Protein-nucleic acid interactions are at the very core of existence as they facilitate all aspects of genome maintenance including genetic recombination, DNA replication and repair, and also, all facets of transcription and the associated mechanisms of gene regulation. A detailed, quantitative understanding of the interactions between proteins and nucleic acids is key to studying and understating all aspect of nucleic acid metabolism. This course will make students intimately familiar with all relevant aspects of proteins and how they interact with nucleic acids as well as the state of the art approaches to performing quantitative studies.
The first series of lectures will cover the details of nucleic acid structure and dynamics and protein structure as it relates to interactions with nucleic acids (i.e., recognition elements). The remainder of the lectures will cover physical biochemical aspects of the interactions of proteins with nucleic acids including thermodynamics, kinetics, site size determination, binding constants, cooperativity, the kinetics of motion, the role of ATP binding and hydrolysis in regulating protein-nucleic acid interactions and finally comparison between bulk-phase and single molecule studies of protein-nucleic acid interactions.
As a large portion of the class is quantitative, students will also be required to do homework assignments so that they become intimately familiar with protein-nucleic acid experiments, data handling and data analysis.Coordinating Instructors:
Piero Bianco pbianco@buffalo.edu
Gerald Koudelka koudelka@buffalo.edu