Official Project Description
Understanding Unique Mechanisms of Membrane Transport
Membrane transporters are an integral part of the cell and serve many roles across their involvement in the transport of ions, nutrients, neurotransmitters, and many drugs across cellular membranes.
There are three major classes of membrane transport proteins that facilitate the transport of various solutes.
These classes are Uniporters, which transport one solute across the membrane in one direction, Symporters, which transport two solutes across the membrane in the same direction, and Antiporters, which transfer two solutes in opposite directions across the membrane.
These classes follow different mechanisms of transport to move their solute(s) across the membrane.
This project will study a powerful mode of transport; proton driven.
LAX3 is the protein of interest, notable also for its characteristic LeuT fold, the same present in neuronal trasporters SERT, DAT, and NET.
Unlike these, however, it seems to not be driven by sodium or chloride gradients, only protons.
This force is difficult to study in full scale systems given the lack of change in covalent bonds used in molecular dynamics simulations.
This project will break down motion in the protonated, and unprotonated state to compare how the differences drive transport.