Life Sciences Commons^™

Protein-Nanoparticle Co-Engineering: Self-Assembly, Intracellular Protein Delivery, And Crispr/Cas9-Based Gene Editing, Rubul Mout

Doctoral Dissertations

Direct cytoplasmic delivery of gene editing nucleases such CRISPR/Cas9 systems and therapeutic proteins provides enormous opportunities in curing human genetic diseases, and assist research in basic cell biology. One approach to attain such a goal is through engineering nanotechnological tools to mimic naturally existing intra- and extracellular protein delivery/transport systems. Nature builds transport systems for proteins and other biomolecules through evolution-derived sophisticated molecular engineering. Inspired by such natural assemblies, I employed molecular engineering approaches to fabricate self-assembled nanostructures to use as intracellular protein delivery tools. Briefly, proteins and gold nanoparticles were co-engineered to carry complementary electrostatic recognition elements. When these …

Reverse Genetics Approach To Examine Myosin Xi Functions In Pollen Tube Growth, Stephanie Lin Madison

Doctoral Dissertations

Pollen tube growth is an essential aspect of plant reproduction because it is the mechanism through which non-motile sperm cells are delivered to ovules thus allowing fertilization to occur. A pollen tube is a single cell that only grows at the tip, and this tip growth depends on actin filaments. Plants encode class VIII and class XI myosins as actin-based motor proteins, of which class XI myosins are required for cell expansion in vegetative tissues.

In Arabidopsis thaliana, 6 of 13 myosin XI genes are expressed in pollen: XIA, XIB, XIC, XID, XIE, and …

The Identification And Characterization Of A Group Of Er Tpr-Containing Adapter Proteins, Johan C. Sunryd

Doctoral Dissertations

The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) is an organelle responsible for a variety of functions in all eukaryotic cells. Some of these functions are localized to specific regions in the ER, such as the ribosome-studded rough ER sheets or the ribosome-free smooth ER sheets. The smooth ER sheets have the ability to form ER tubules, which extend throughout the cell and make contact with other organelles. In order to accommodate these localized functional regions, a certain degree of heterogeneity and compartmentalization into sub-domains exists within the ER. Since the ER membrane and lumen are contiguous, the compartmentalization of the ER into sub-domain …