Polarized microscopy technique shows new details of how proteins are arranged
Monday, April 18, 2011 - 11:32
in Physics & Chemistry
A key component of the nuclear pore complex — a Y-shaped cluster of proteins that helps determine what gets in and what stays out of a cell’s nucleus — was first photographed and modeled at Rockefeller in 2009. But fundamental questions about how the structures were aligned in relation to the rest of the 30-protein complex remained. Researchers at Rockefeller University have now developed a new technique that uses polarized light microscopy to help answer questions about the proteins’ orientation.