Principal Investigator Gabriela Schlau-Cohen
Project Website http://www.schlaucohenlab.com/
The Schlau-Cohen Lab uses a combinatino of single-molecule and ultrafast spectroscopies to explore the energetic and structural dynamics of biological systems.
Work is multidisciplinary; we combine tools from chemistry, optics, biology, and microscopy to develop new approaches to probe dynamics. There are two major research thrusts. The first is developing a single-molecule ultrafast experiment, which will be a tool to connect sub-nanosecond and second dynamics. The second is merging optical spectroscopy with model membrane systems to provide a novel probe of how biological processes extend beyond the nanometer scale of individual proteins.
Inspired by the growing need for solar energy, one application of these approaches will be exploring the underlying mechanisms of photosynthetic light harvesting. Photosynthetic organisms convert absorbed sunlight to electricity with remarkable near unity quantum efficiency by transporting energy through a network of proteins. To understand the mechanisms behind this fundamental process, experiments will probe both the heterogeneity of the individual proteins and how they are wired together to produce efficient and adaptive systems.