Volume 50, Issue 50 p. 12103-12108
Communication

Imaging and Quantifying Chemical and Physical Properties of Native Proteins at Molecular Resolution by Force–Volume AFM

Dr. Izhar Medalsy,

ETH Zürich, Dept of Biosystems Science and Engineering, 4058 Basel (Switzerland)

Search for more papers by this author
Dr. Ulf Hensen,

ETH Zürich, Dept of Biosystems Science and Engineering, 4058 Basel (Switzerland)

Search for more papers by this author
Prof. Dr. Daniel J. Muller,

Corresponding Author

ETH Zürich, Dept of Biosystems Science and Engineering, 4058 Basel (Switzerland)

ETH Zürich, Dept of Biosystems Science and Engineering, 4058 Basel (Switzerland)Search for more papers by this author
First published: 17 October 2011
Citations: 71

This work was supported by ELSO, EMBO, KTS, and SNF. We thank C. Bippes, M. Pfreundschuh, and G. Büldt for their support. AFM=atomic force microscopy.

Abstract

Use the force: Force–volume atomic force microscopy (AFM) can image native membrane proteins and quantify and map their chemical and physical properties at molecular resolution (see images). For the light-driven proton pump bacteriorhodopsin (BR), the data shows that lipids form a flexible framework embedding a mechanically anisotropic proton pump, and that the BR adopts different structurally stable conformations that are important for proton pumping.

The full text of this article hosted at iucr.org is unavailable due to technical difficulties.