• Rapid Communication in Photoscience
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2015

For understanding molecular mechanisms of photochemical reactions, in particular reactions of proteins with biological functions, it is important to elucidate both the initial reactions from the photoexcited states and the series of subsequent chemical reactions, e.g., conformation, intermolecular interactions (hydrogen bonding, hydrophobic interactions), and inter-protein interactions (oligomer formation, dissociation reactions). Although time-resolved detection of such dynamics is essential, these dynamics have been very difficult to track by traditional spectroscopic techniques. Here, relatively new approaches for probing the dynamics of protein photochemical reactions using time-resolved transient grating (TG) are reviewed. By using this method, a variety of spectrally silent dynamics can be detected and such data provide a valuable description about the reaction scheme. Herein, a blue light sensor protein TePixD is the exemplar. The initial photochemistry for TePixD occurs around the chromophore and is detected readily by light absorption, but subsequent reactions are spectrally silent. The TG experiments revealed conformational changes and changes in inter-protein interactions, which are essential for TePixD function. The TG experiments also showed the importance of fluctuations of the intermediates as the driving force of the reaction. This technique is complementary to optical absorption detection methods. The TG signal contains a variety of unique information, which is difficult to obtain by other methods. The advantages and methods for signal analyses are described in detail in this review.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.117-122
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• 2018

3D printing technology and its applications have grown rapidly in academia and industry. We consider a 3D printing system designed for the selective laser sintering (SLS) method, which is one of the powder bed fusion (PBF) techniques to build up the final product by layering sintered powder slices. Thermal distortion of printing products is a critical challenge in 3D printing. This study investigates temperature-dependent conformational behaviors of 3D printed samples of sintered poly-ether-ether-ketone (PEEK) powders using molecular dynamics simulations. The wear and chemical resistance properties of PEEK are understood, as it is a well-known biocompatible material used for implants. However, studies on physical phenomena at nanoscale in PEEK are rarely published in public. We simulate dissipative particle dynamics to elucidate how a cavity regime forms in PEEK at different system temperatures. We demonstrate how PEEK structures deform subject to the system temperature distribution.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetic Resonance Society
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.18-25
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• 2018

Replication protein A (RPA) is an essential single-stranded DNA binding protein in DNA processing. It is known that N terminal domain of RPA70 (RPA70N) recruits various protein partners including damage-response proteins such as p53, ATRIP, Rad9, and MRE11. Although the common binding residues of RPA70N were revealed, dynamic properties of the protein are not studied yet. In this study, we measured $^{15}N$ relaxation parameters ($T_1,\;T_2$ and heteronuclear NOE) of human RPA70N and analyzed them using model-free analysis. Our data showed that the two loops near the binding site experience fast time scale motion while the binding site does not. It suggests that the protein binding surface of RPA70N is mostly rigid for minimizing entropy cost of binding and the loops can experience conformational changes.

• YAKHAK HOEJI
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• v.54 no.1
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• pp.67-74
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• 2010

Some of the benzopyrene (BP)-DNA adduct are known to build intercalated motif between flanking base pairs in damaged DNA depending on the structural condition. The size of benzopyrene itself is definitely not comparable with any of the DNA bases and thus the question whether the lesion of some base pair by insertion of benzopyrene can happen with or without a dramatic distortion of the helical structure is a highly interesting theme. In this work we used a molecular dynamics simulation based on the theory of molecular mechanics. The specific consequences about the structural properties of the intercalated structures and benzopyrene motif in minor groove of the double helix are deduced after 5 ns simulation time.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.415-424
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• 1997

Conformational flexibilities of the GlcNAc(β1,3)Gal(β)OMe are investigated through NMR spectroscopy and molecular modeling. Adiabatic energy map generated with a dielectric constant of 50 contains three local minima. All of the molecular dynamics simulations on three local minimum energy structures show fluctuations between two low energy structures, N2 at φ=80° and ψ=60° and N3 at φ=60° and ψ=-40°. We have presented adequate evidences to state that GlcNAc(β1,3)Gal(β)OMe exists in two conformationally discrete forms. Two state model of N2 and N3 conformers with a population ratio of 40:60 is used to calculate the effective cross relaxation rate and reproduces the experimental NOEs very well. Molecular dynamics simulation in conjunction with two state model proves successfully the dynamic equilibrium existed in GlcNAc(β1,3)Gal(β)OMe and can be considered as a powerful method to analyze the motional properties in the structure of carbohydrate. This observation also cautions against the indiscriminate use of a rigid model to analyze NMR data.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.19 no.11
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• pp.1217-1221
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• 1998

We present results of molecular dynamic (MD) simulations for the segmental motion of liquid n-heptadecane in order to investigate conformational transitions from one rotational isomeric state to another. The behavior of the hazard plots for n-heptadecane obtained from our MD simulations are compared with that for polymer of Brownian dynamics (BD) study. The transition rate at the ending dihedrals of the n-heptadecane chain is much higher than that at the central dihedrals. In the study of correlation between transitions of neighboring dihedrals, the large value of c2 implies that some 30% of the transitions of the second neighbors can be regarded as following transitions two bonds away in a correlated fashion. Finally the analysis of multiple transitions and the number of times occurred in the initial 0.005 ns are discussed.

• BMB Reports
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• v.54 no.10
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• pp.489-496
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• 2021

Chromatin has highly organized structures in the nucleus, and these higher-order structures are proposed to regulate gene activities and cellular processes. Sequencing-based techniques, such as Hi-C, and fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) have revealed a spatial segregation of active and inactive compartments of chromatin, as well as the non-random positioning of chromosomes in the nucleus, respectively. However, regardless of their efficiency in capturing target genomic sites, these techniques are limited to fixed cells. Since chromatin has dynamic structures, live cell imaging techniques are highlighted for their ability to detect conformational changes in chromatin at a specific time point, or to track various arrangements of chromatin through long-term imaging. Given that the imaging approaches to study live cells are dramatically advanced, we recapitulate methods that are widely used to visualize the dynamics of higher-order chromatin structures.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.29 no.8
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• pp.1505-1509
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• 2008

Comparative molecular simulations were performed to establish molecular interaction and inhibitory effect of flavonoid myricetin on formation of amyloid fibris. For computational comparison, the conformational stability of myricetin with amyloid $\beta$ -peptide (A$\beta$ ) and $\beta$ -amyloid fibrils (fA$\beta$) were traced with multiple molecular dynamics simulations (MD) using the CHARMM program from Monte Carlo docked structures. Simulations showed that the inhibition by myricetin involves binding of the flavonoid to fA$\beta$ rather than A$\beta$ . Even in MD simulations over 5 ns at 300 K, myricetin/fA$\beta$ complex remained stable in compact conformation for multiple trajectories. In contrast, myricetin/A$\beta$ complex mostly turned into the dissociated conformation during the MD simulations at 300 K. These multiple MD simulations provide a theoretical basis for the higher inhibitory effect of myricetin on fibrillogenesis of fA$\beta$ relative to A$\beta$ . Significant binding between myricetin and fA$\beta$ observed from the computational simulations clearly reflects the previous experimental results in which only fA$\beta$ had bound to the myricetin molecules.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.22 no.9
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• pp.979-983
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• 2001

Thermoanaerobacter ethanolicus is a strictly anaerobic and thermophilic bacterium whose optimum temperature ranges over $65-68^{\circ}C.$ T. ethanolicus was known to contain a bipolar very long chain fatty acyl component such as $\alpha$, $\omega-1316-dimethyloctacosanedioate$, as one of the major membrane components. However, exact physiological role of this unusual component in the membrane remains unknown. Such a very long chain fatty acyl component, $\alpha$, ${\omega}-1316-dimethyloctacosanedioate$, dimethyl ester (DME C30), was isolated, and purified from the membrane of T. ethanolicus. As a function of added concentrations of the $\alpha$, $\omega-1316-dimethyloctacosanedioate$, dimethyl ester (DME C30) or cholesterol into the standard liposomes, the acyl chain ordering effect was investigated by the steady-state anisotropy with 1,6-diphenyl-1,3,5-hexatriene (DPH) as a fluorescent probe. Acyl chain order parameter (S) of vesicles containing DME C30 is higher comparing with phosphatidylcholine (PC) only vesicles. This result was discussed thermodynamically with the aid of the simulated annealing molecular dynamics simulations. Through the investigation of all the possible conformational changes of DME C30 or cholesterol, we showed that DME C30 is very flexible and its conformation is variable depending on the temperature comparing with cholesterol, which is rigid and restricted at overall temperature. We propose that the conformational change of DME C30, not the configurational change, may be involved in the regulation of the membrane fluidity against the changes of external temperature.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.55 no.5
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• pp.746-750
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• 2011

Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) is an emerging fluorescence technique used to study the dynamics of proteins on a millisecond to microsecond time scale at the single-molecule level. Solution pH-modulated protein conformational changes can be manifested by binding rate, fluorescence lifetime, and binding specificity of a probe molecule. The fluorescence lifetime of Nile red (NR) bound to apomyoglobin (apoMb) was measured to be $6{\pm}0.3$ ns, much longer than that in water solution ($2.9{\pm}0.2$ ns). As the unfolding population of apoMb increased by lowering pH of solution, the fraction for the longer lifetime of NR decreased with an increasing fraction for the shorter lifetime of NR in water. Unlike 1-anilino-8-naphthalene sulfonic acid, which has many lifetimes due to nonspecific binding to the unfolded apoMb, NR bound to apoMb possesses only a single lifetime. These results suggest that NR binds specifically to native apoMb and thus can be utilized to probe the folding/unfolding dynamics of apoMb using FCS.