DNAMET
Efficient NMR crystallography of nucleic acid systems
| Coordinatore | UNIVERSITY OF DURHAM
Organization address
address: STOCKTON ROAD THE PALATINE CENTRE contact info |
| Nazionalità Coordinatore | United Kingdom [UK] |
| Totale costo | 156˙775 € |
| EC contributo | 156˙775 € |
| Programma | FP7-PEOPLE
Specific programme "People" implementing the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community for research, technological development and demonstration activities (2007 to 2013) |
| Code Call | FP7-PEOPLE-2011-IEF |
| Funding Scheme | MC-IEF |
| Anno di inizio | 2012 |
| Periodo (anno-mese-giorno) | 2012-06-01 - 2013-11-30 |
Partecipanti
| # | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
UNIVERSITY OF DURHAM
Organization address
address: STOCKTON ROAD THE PALATINE CENTRE contact info |
UK (DURHAM) | coordinator | 156˙775.05 |
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Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)
'The goal of this proposal is to develop efficient strategies for the nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) crystallography of organic molecular solids, focussing on nucleic acids and their derivatives. These systems are natural targets for the developing field of crystallography via NMR since H-bonding and tautomerism are central to their biological activity. The structure and function of RNA and DNA depends strongly on associated metal ions and with water molecules, but the non-covalent and dynamic nature of these interactions creates severe problems for their characterisation in the solution state, while characterising the role of water and hydrogen bonding in the solid state via X-ray diffraction techniques is also difficult. As well as providing a variety of challenges for NMR, such as paramagnetic metal ions, these studies will provide direct information on local structure and dynamics in these key biological materials that is inaccessible to conventional crystallography.'
Introduzione (Teaser)
Scientists have gained new insights into the structure of biological molecules using highly advanced equipment and research methods.
Descrizione progetto (Article)
Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) crystallography is a relatively new scientific technique that can be used to analyse the structure of complex molecules. This includes the building blocks of DNA and proteins (nucleic acid bases and amino acids, respectively), where an understanding of structure is key to understanding biological function.
The EU-funded 'Efficient NMR crystallography of nucleic acid systems' (DNAMET) project was established to develop new NMR crystallography protocols and methods for studying these kinds of molecules. Specifically, researchers were tasked with advancing methods to study the position of hydrogen atoms in crystals derived from these molecules.
In doing so, they successfully characterised the structure of a number of crystalline samples. The data obtained demonstrated that the motion of molecules within a crystal must be taken into account when determining their structure.
Another area of the project focused on characterising the role of water molecules around phosphate units and metal ions. This is important partly because the structure and function of RNA and DNA depend on associated metal ions.
The DNAMET project has provided valuable insights into the dynamics of key biological molecules, which would not have been possible using conventional techniques. It has also generated research methods and scientific literature that will be of great interest to fellow biologists in this field.