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Investigating Myosin Ensemble Force Generation Using Optical Tweezers, Janie Watts
Investigating Myosin Ensemble Force Generation Using Optical Tweezers, Janie Watts
Honors Theses
Myosin is a motor protein that facilitates muscle contraction and movement by stepping along actin filaments using energy from ATP hydrolysis. If myosin or other motors are disrupted throughout the body, it can have many harmful effects. Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is a disease caused by gene mutations that affect myosin heavy chains in the heart. The tissue of the heart becomes abnormally thick, which can make it more difficult to pump blood or block blood flow out of the heart. Our goal is to discern the mechanistic difference function of a healthy and diseased heart. To accomplish this, we construct model …
Investigatin Actin-Myosin Mechanics To Model Heart Disease Using Fluorescence Microscopy And Optical Trapping, Justin Edward Reynolds
Investigatin Actin-Myosin Mechanics To Model Heart Disease Using Fluorescence Microscopy And Optical Trapping, Justin Edward Reynolds
Honors Theses
Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) is a hereditary disease in which the myocardium becomes hypertrophied, making it more difficult for the heart to pump blood. HCM is commonly caused by a mutation in the β-cardiac myosin II heavy chain. Myosin is a motor protein that facilitates muscle contraction by converting chemical energy from ATP hydrolysis into mechanical work and concomitantly moving along actin filaments. Optical tweezers have been used previously to analyze single myosin biophysical properties; however, myosin does not work as a single unit within the heart. Multiple myosin interacts to displace actin filaments and do not have the same properties …
Modeling Mechanisms Behind Force Generation By Actin Polymerization, Seyed Fowad Motahari
Modeling Mechanisms Behind Force Generation By Actin Polymerization, Seyed Fowad Motahari
Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Actin polymerization is the primary mechanism for overcoming the large turgor pressure that opposes endocytosis in yeast. While generation of pushing forces by actin polymerization is fairly well understood, it is not clear how actin polymerization produces pulling forces. In order to understand this process, it is necessary to simulate polymerization of filaments having various types of interactions with the membrane. Since existing methodologies in the literature do not treat such problems correctly, we develop a thermodynamically consistent methodology for treating polymerization of filaments having arbitrary interaction potentials with the membrane. Then I perform stochastic simulations for a system of …