Cells use a set of molecular processes, called cell-signaling, to recognize and respond to stimuli. Cell-signaling processes work together to sense the outside world by recognizing, processing, and transmitting signals within and outside a cell. Most of these processes require the molecules within the cell to organize in specific fashion in various cellular locations, which controls the way they react with other molecules. We employ tools and knowledge from various fields of Physics to understand how biomolecules organize in space and time and how the spatial organization of the biomolecules help cells sense their world.

Faculty: Sumantra Sarkar

References:

Concentration dependence of diffusion-limited reaction rates and its consequences Sumantra Sarkar, Physical Review X, 2020

How Anionic Lipids Affect Spatiotemporal Properties of KRAS4B on Model Membranes
Van A. Ngo, Sumantra Sarkar, Chris Neale, and Angel Enrique Garcia; Journal of Physical Chemistry B, 2020

Presence or absence of Ras-dimerization shows distinct kinetic signature in Ras-Raf interaction: Sumantra Sarkar and Angel E. Garcia, Biophysical Journal, 2020