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Allophycocyanin A is a carbon dioxide receptor in the cyanobacterial phycobilisome (2022)
Journal Article
Guillen-Garcia, A., Gibson, S., Jordan, C., Ramaswamy, V., Linthwaite, V., Bromley, E., …Cann, M. (2022). Allophycocyanin A is a carbon dioxide receptor in the cyanobacterial phycobilisome. Nature Communications, 13, Article 5289. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32925-6

Light harvesting is fundamental for production of ATP and reducing equivalents for CO2 fixation during photosynthesis. However, electronic energy transfer (EET) through a photosystem can harm the photosynthetic apparatus when not balanced with CO2. H... Read More about Allophycocyanin A is a carbon dioxide receptor in the cyanobacterial phycobilisome.

Threaded Rings that Swim in Excitable Media (2019)
Journal Article
Cincotti, A., Maucher, F., Evans, D., Chapin, B. M., Horner, K., Bromley, E., …Sutcliffe, P. (2019). Threaded Rings that Swim in Excitable Media. Physical Review Letters, 123(25), Article 258102. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.123.258102

Cardiac tissue and the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction provide two notable examples of excitable media that support scroll waves, in which a filament core is the source of spiral waves of excitation. Here we consider a novel topological configuration i... Read More about Threaded Rings that Swim in Excitable Media.

The Bar-Hinge Motor: A synthetic protein design exploiting conformational switching to achieve directional motility (2019)
Journal Article
Small, L., Zuckermann, M., Sessions, R., Curmi, P., Linke, H., Forde, N., & Bromley, E. (2019). The Bar-Hinge Motor: A synthetic protein design exploiting conformational switching to achieve directional motility. New Journal of Physics, 21, Article 013002. https://doi.org/10.1088/1367-2630/aaf3ca

One challenge to synthetic biology is to design functional machines from natural building blocks, from individual amino acids up to larger motifs such as the coiled coil. Here we investigate a novel bipedal motor concept, the Bar-Hinge Motor (BHM), a... Read More about The Bar-Hinge Motor: A synthetic protein design exploiting conformational switching to achieve directional motility.

Stabilising Peptoid Helices Using Non‐Chiral Fluoroalkyl Monomers (2018)
Journal Article
Gimenez, D., Aguilar, J., Bromley, E., & Cobb, S. (2018). Stabilising Peptoid Helices Using Non‐Chiral Fluoroalkyl Monomers. Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 57(33), 10549-10553. https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.201804488

Stability towards protease degradation combined with modular synthesis has made peptoids of considerable interest in the fields of chemical biology, medicine, and biomaterials. Given their tertiary amide backbone, peptoids lack the capacity to hydrog... Read More about Stabilising Peptoid Helices Using Non‐Chiral Fluoroalkyl Monomers.

Excited-State Aromatic Interactions in the Aggregation-Induced Emission of Molecular Rotors (2017)
Journal Article
Sturala, J., Etherington, M. K., Bismillah, A. N., Higginbotham, H. F., Trewby, W. J., Aguilar, J. A., …McGonigal, P. R. (2017). Excited-State Aromatic Interactions in the Aggregation-Induced Emission of Molecular Rotors. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 139(49), 17882-17889. https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.7b08570

Small, apolar aromatic groups, such as phenyl rings, are commonly included in the structures of fluorophores in order to impart hindered intramolecular rotations, leading to desirable solid-state luminescence properties. However, they are not normall... Read More about Excited-State Aromatic Interactions in the Aggregation-Induced Emission of Molecular Rotors.

Construction of a chassis for a tripartite protein-based molecular motor (2017)
Journal Article
Small, L. S., Bruning, M., Thomson, A. R., Boyle, A. L., Davies, R. B., Curmi, P. M., …Bromley, E. H. (2017). Construction of a chassis for a tripartite protein-based molecular motor. ACS Synthetic Biology, 6(6), 1096-1102. https://doi.org/10.1021/acssynbio.7b00037

Improving our understanding of biological motors, both to fully comprehend their activities in vital processes, and to exploit their impressive abilities for use in bionanotechnology, is highly desirable. One means of understanding these systems is t... Read More about Construction of a chassis for a tripartite protein-based molecular motor.

Log D versus HPLC derived hydrophobicity: The development of predictive tools to aid in the rational design of bioactive peptoids (2017)
Journal Article
Bolt, H., Williams, C., Brooks, R., Zuckermann, R., Cobb, S., & Bromley, E. (2017). Log D versus HPLC derived hydrophobicity: The development of predictive tools to aid in the rational design of bioactive peptoids. Biopolymers, 108(4), Article e23014. https://doi.org/10.1002/bip.23014

Hydrophobicity has proven to be an extremely useful parameter in small molecule drug discovery programmes given that it can be used as a predictive tool to enable rational design. For larger molecules, including peptoids, where folding is possible, t... Read More about Log D versus HPLC derived hydrophobicity: The development of predictive tools to aid in the rational design of bioactive peptoids.

Structural characterization suggests models for monomeric and dimeric forms of full-length ezrin (2016)
Journal Article
Phang, J., Harrop, S., Duff, A., Sokolova, A., Crossett, B., Walsh, J., …Curmi, P. (2016). Structural characterization suggests models for monomeric and dimeric forms of full-length ezrin. Biochemical Journal, 473(18), 2763-2782. https://doi.org/10.1042/bcj20160541

Ezrin is a member of the ERM (ezrin–radixin–moesin) family of proteins that have been conserved through metazoan evolution. These proteins have dormant and active forms, where the latter links the actin cytoskeleton to membranes. ERM proteins have th... Read More about Structural characterization suggests models for monomeric and dimeric forms of full-length ezrin.

Motor properties from persistence: a linear molecular walker lacking spatial and temporal asymmetry (2015)
Journal Article
Zuckermann, M., Angstmann, C., Schmitt, R., Blab, G., Bromley, E., Forde, N., …Curmi, P. (2015). Motor properties from persistence: a linear molecular walker lacking spatial and temporal asymmetry. New Journal of Physics, 17(5), Article 055017. https://doi.org/10.1088/1367-2630/17/5/055017

The stepping direction of linear molecular motors is usually defined by a spatial asymmetry of the motor, its track, or both. Here we present a model for a molecular walker that undergoes biased directional motion along a symmetric track in the prese... Read More about Motor properties from persistence: a linear molecular walker lacking spatial and temporal asymmetry.

Structural insights into quinolone antibiotic resistance mediated by pentapeptide repeat proteins: conserved surface loops direct the activity of a Qnr protein from a Gram-negative bacterium. (2011)
Journal Article
Xiong, X., Bromley, E., Oelschlaeger, P., Woolfson, D., & Spencer, J. (2011). Structural insights into quinolone antibiotic resistance mediated by pentapeptide repeat proteins: conserved surface loops direct the activity of a Qnr protein from a Gram-negative bacterium. Nucleic Acids Research, 39(9), 3917-3927. https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkq1296

Designed alpha-Helical Tectons for Constructing Multicomponent Synthetic Biological Systems (2009)
Journal Article
Bromley, E., Sessions, R., Thomson, A., & Woolfson, D. (2009). Designed alpha-Helical Tectons for Constructing Multicomponent Synthetic Biological Systems. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 131(3), 928-930. https://doi.org/10.1021/ja804231a

One possible route to develop new synthetic-biological systems is to assemble discrete nanoscale objects from programmed peptide-based building blocks. We describe an algorithm to design such blocks based on the coiled-coil protein-folding motif. The... Read More about Designed alpha-Helical Tectons for Constructing Multicomponent Synthetic Biological Systems.

Rational design of peptide-based building blocks for nanoscience and synthetic biology (2009)
Journal Article
Armstrong, C., Boyle, A., Bromley, E., Mahmoud, Z., Smith, L., Thomson, A., & Woolfson, D. (2009). Rational design of peptide-based building blocks for nanoscience and synthetic biology. Faraday Discussions, 143, 305-317

The rational design of peptides that fold to form discrete nanoscale objects, and/or self-assemble into nanostructured materials is an exciting challenge. Such efforts test and extend our understanding of sequence-to-structure relationships in protei... Read More about Rational design of peptide-based building blocks for nanoscience and synthetic biology.