Single-Molecule Studies of Protein Folding with Optical Tweezers

Label-free free-solution nanoaperture optical tweezers for single molecule protein studies.

Nanoaperture optical tweezers are emerging as useful label-free, free-solution tools for the detection and identification of biological molecules and their interactions at the single molecule level. Nanoaperture optical tweezers provide a low-cost, scalable, straight-forward, high-speed and highly sensitive (SNR ∼ 33) platform to observe real-time dynamics and to quantify binding kinetics of pr...

Single-molecule fluorescence studies of Protein Folding and Molecular Chaperones

Folding of newly synthesized proteins is an essential part of protein biosynthesis and misfolding can result in protein aggregation which can also lead to several severe diseases. Protein folding is a highly heterogeneous process and rarely populated intermediate states may play an important role. Single-molecule techniques are ideally suited to resolve these heterogeneities. In this thesis, I ...

Single-molecule fluorescence studies of protein folding and conformational dynamics.

Single molecule mechanics of biopolymers: An optical tweezers study

Bibliography 97 Publications 101 Samenvatting (Dutch) 103 Dankwoord / Acknowledgments 107 iii Preface This work describes the project I have done in the Physics of Complex Systems group at the Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, to obtain my degree as Master of Physics. The project comprised micromechanical experiments on the semi-flexible biopolymers microtubules and F-actin. An independent measure...

High-Resolution Optical Tweezers for Single-Molecule Manipulation

Forces hold everything together and determine its structure and dynamics. In particular, tiny forces of 1-100 piconewtons govern the structures and dynamics of biomacromolecules. These forces enable folding, assembly, conformational fluctuations, or directional movements of biomacromolecules over sub-nanometer to micron distances. Optical tweezers have become a revolutionary tool to probe the f...