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INVESTIGATING THE UNKNOWN “Proteins are temperamental.” That’s what Assistant Professor Katie Frato tells the students in her biochemistry labs. A protein is made of a linear chain of chemical groups which folds into a specific 3D structure and creates a very specific chemical environment in the center. How the protein “decides” to fold into a particular shape is a huge question in biochemistry and biology. Dr. Frato’s research group studies a smaller, but related question. She and two student researchers— Miranda Wilson, ’19, and Emily Tabaie, ’19—are studying two very similar diatoms, one of which lives in arctic sea ice and one of which lives in the temperate ocean. How does the sequence of a closely related protein in these two single-celled organisms enable them to adapt so they can maintain the very specific structure necessary for the proteins to function at such dramatically different temperatures? Dr. Frato says, “How organisms evolve to grow in such different environments is a very ecological question. But it’s also a kind of engineering question. If we can figure out how biology defines the structure that these proteins have, then as biochemical engineers could we design a protein that works at different temperatures?” There are many industrial applications that use proteins. For example, laundry detergents contain enzymes that break apart fats. If those enzymes worked better in cold water, doing the laundry would be much more energy efficient. Dr. Frato’s former research student Saveeta Rampur, ’17, is now testing laundry and dish detergents at DuPont in the Bay Area. Both Miranda and Emily are Cell and Molecular Biology majors, minoring in Chemistry. Miranda joined Dr. Frato’s lab shortly after changing her major to Cell and Molecular Biology two years ago. “I chose this project because it combined both chemistry and biology, with an emphasis on biochemistry, and explored a discipline of science I knew very little about,” she says. “I have learned much more than there would be time for in a classroom setting.”
“Science is universal. The more science courses I take, the more I realize I want to be the person asking the big questions.” MIRANDA WILSON, ’18 CMOL
Emily has worked on this project since last spring. “It’s so rewarding when an experiment goes as expected,” she says. “It also tests your problem-solving skills, because when an experiment does not go the way you expected, you have to troubleshoot and find another method to get the results you wanted.” “We have great data on this project,” Dr. Frato says. The students presented their preliminary data at the Biophysical Society National Meeting in San Francisco in February. They are currently “nerding out” on their data and working on a paper for submission in December to either “Proteins: Structure, Function and Bioinformatics” or “Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry.”
COMING IN 2021: SCIENCE ON DISPLAY New multi-investigator labs for world-class research. Flexible teaching labs equipped for science courses at all levels, from the Core to the advanced.
