High-Throughput Single-Molecule FRET Studies with SPAD Arrays
Event details
Date | 30.06.2017 |
Hour | 11:00 › 12:00 |
Speaker | Xavier Michalet, Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, UCLA |
Location | |
Category | Conferences - Seminars |
Abstract:
Single-molecule fluorescence has emerged more than two decades ago as a powerful tool to investigate biological processes at the molecular level. Its main advantage over traditional "bulk" techniques is the possibility to disentangle sample heterogeneity and stochasticity by either taking snapshots of the conformational state of individual molecules (proteins, DNA, etc.), or by following the dynamics of individual molecules with sub-ms (and in some cases ns) resolution. However, for most of its short history, the field has been hampered by low throughput. Scientific cameras have progressed to a point where hundreds of immobilized single-molecules can be studied in parallel, but immobilization is a big constraint. Moreover, the temporal resolution of these measurements remains limited to at best a few ms, which is too short to study fast enzyme fluctuations.
Over the past few years, our group has explored several alternative technologies in collaboration with detector groups, to go beyond these limitations. Here we present our recent results obtained with SPAD arrays developed using a custom technology ensuring high quantum efficiency in the visible spectrum, allowing up to a 48-fold throughput enhancement. This new technology promises to bring single-molecule spectroscopy out of the lab and into mainstream biotechnology applications.
Bio:
Xavier Michalet received an Engineering Degree from Ecole Polytechnique (France), before working toward a Doctorate es Science in soft condensed matter under the supervision of David Bensimon at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris. After his doctorate, he joined the group of Aaron Bensimon at the Pasteur Institute, where he developed genetic applications of DNA molecular combing. He then moved to California, joining Shimon Weiss’ group at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, working on quantum dots applications to biology. He is currently a researcher in the Weiss group at UCLA, working on various single-molecule biophysics topics ranging from receptor diffusion to protein folding and RNA transcription, and developing new techniques and detectors for single-molecule spectroscopy and microscopy.
Single-molecule fluorescence has emerged more than two decades ago as a powerful tool to investigate biological processes at the molecular level. Its main advantage over traditional "bulk" techniques is the possibility to disentangle sample heterogeneity and stochasticity by either taking snapshots of the conformational state of individual molecules (proteins, DNA, etc.), or by following the dynamics of individual molecules with sub-ms (and in some cases ns) resolution. However, for most of its short history, the field has been hampered by low throughput. Scientific cameras have progressed to a point where hundreds of immobilized single-molecules can be studied in parallel, but immobilization is a big constraint. Moreover, the temporal resolution of these measurements remains limited to at best a few ms, which is too short to study fast enzyme fluctuations.
Over the past few years, our group has explored several alternative technologies in collaboration with detector groups, to go beyond these limitations. Here we present our recent results obtained with SPAD arrays developed using a custom technology ensuring high quantum efficiency in the visible spectrum, allowing up to a 48-fold throughput enhancement. This new technology promises to bring single-molecule spectroscopy out of the lab and into mainstream biotechnology applications.
Bio:
Xavier Michalet received an Engineering Degree from Ecole Polytechnique (France), before working toward a Doctorate es Science in soft condensed matter under the supervision of David Bensimon at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris. After his doctorate, he joined the group of Aaron Bensimon at the Pasteur Institute, where he developed genetic applications of DNA molecular combing. He then moved to California, joining Shimon Weiss’ group at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, working on quantum dots applications to biology. He is currently a researcher in the Weiss group at UCLA, working on various single-molecule biophysics topics ranging from receptor diffusion to protein folding and RNA transcription, and developing new techniques and detectors for single-molecule spectroscopy and microscopy.
Practical information
- Informed public
- Free
- This event is internal
Organizer
- IMT - Microengineering Institute