Invited Speaker
Sonia Trigueros
DNA Conformation and Biomolecular Motors: New Nanomedicine Research Targets
DNA supercoiling is a powerful thermodynamic force that drives and directs many DNA associated processes in vivo. The level of supercoiling or DNA spatial conformation is constantly changing. DNA biomolecular motors such as DNA topoisomerases and DNA translocases are responsible for maintaining an essential steady state of supercoiling.
I use a combination of cell biology, biochemical and biophysical techniques to study the role of DNA biomolecular motors and DNA topology in different cellular processes.
I study the DNA topology dependence of the different steps in site-specific recombination events using DNA substrates with different superhelical density. By Total Internal Reflection Fluorescent Microscopy, I characterize at the level of the single molecule the activity of DNA molecular motors. Using high-resolution atomic force microscopy (AM-AFM) in physiological conditions, I characterize at the single molecule level the nature of the forces that drive relevant DNA conformational changes by it self or after protein interaction. Additionally, we observe for the first time DNA conformational changes imaged by high-speed AFM at time resolutions up to 20 ms and sub-nm spatial resolution.
DNA molecular motors are my actual research on nanomedicine.