Our brain in sickness and in health: focusing on the lipid membrane

This seminar will take place Monday 5th February at 2pm.

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Introduction

Professor Sudipta Maiti is visiting from the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai. Prof Maiti is an expert in microscopy, whose main field of study is the structure-function relationships underlying the pathological mechanisms of Alzheimer's Disease. Please see below for an abstract for his talk, "Our brain in sickness and in health: focusing on the lipid membrane".
 

 
Abstract:

 

Our neurons send and receive signals, so we can happily say “cogito ergo sum”. The fundamental molecular basis of neuronal signaling is the release of a small messenger (‘neurotransmitter’) molecule through a transient pore in the lipid membrane of one neuron, and its subsequent capture by a protein (“receptor”) molecule on the membrane of another. While the biophysics of the transmitter-receptor interaction is well-established, the role of the ever-present membrane in the signaling process is poorly understood. We probe the physical properties of biologically relevant lipid membranes and the location of disease-causing proteins in them, utilizing different biophysical tools ranging from atomic force microscopy to single-molecule imaging. We find that many of the puzzles about how normal signaling occurs, how some proteins (such as amyloid beta, linked to Alzheimer’s disease) can be neurotoxic, and how some drugs of abuse can affect the brain, are related to how the material properties of the membrane change under these conditions.