Methodologies to investigate three- dimensional structure of biological macromolecules using electron microscopy and image analysis.

The course covers biophysical methods for characterising conformational transitions and reaction mechanisms of proteins and other biological macromolecules. It is especially suited for students in the Biology MSc Majors “Structural Biology & Biophysics”, “Biochemistry”and “Chemical Biology”, as well as for MSc students of “Chemistry and Interdisciplinary Natural Sciences”.

The school (1.9. - 12.9.2008) will discuss the recent progress and challenges in biological and medical imaging. Cutting edge techniques using a wide range of imaging mechanisms will be put in the context of selected biomedical problems. In particular, multimodal and multiscale imaging methods as well as supporting technologies such as computer aided image analysis and modeling will be discussed.

The course can be taken alone or in combination with the spring course “A Problem Based Approach to Cellular Biochemistry”. During this seminar style course, students will explore research topics in cellular biochemistry focused on the structure, function and regulation of selected cell components. In the best case, student efforts can be aligned with an ongoing or future research project.

Motor proteins convert chemical energy into mechanical motion. In this block course, we study dynein motor proteins in cilia. Dynein causes conformational change upon ATP hydrolysis and finally generate ciliary bending motion. Participants will analyze cryo-EM data of cilia and visualize in vivo 3D structure of dynein to learn how motor proteins function in the cell.

This course provides an in-depth discussion of two main methods to determine the 3D structures of macromolecules and complexes at high resolution: X-ray crystallography and cryo-electron microscopy. Both techniques result in electron density maps that are interpreted by atomic models.