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Monitoring AuNP growth. Methods capable of controlling synthesis at the level of an individual nanoparticle are a key step towards improved reproducibility and scalability in engineering complex nanomaterials. To address this, we combine spatially-patterned activation of the photoreductant sodium pyruvate with interferometric scattering microscopy to achieve fast, label-free monitoring and control of hundreds of gold nanoparticles in real-time. Individual particle growth kinetics are well-described by two-step nucleation autocatalysis model, but with a distribution of individual rate constants that changes with reaction conditions.

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Yize Wu joining us as a MRes student in Interdisciplinary Chemistry, Yize joins us to work on biohybrid nanopores.

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Milan Singh Milan joins us as a MSci student this year, working on artificial cell self-replication.

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TOM diffusion is coupled to permeability. Here we show the correlation between lateral protein diffusion and channel activity of the general protein import pore of mitochondria (TOM-CC) in membranes resting on ultrathin hydrogel films. Using electrode-free optical recordings of ion flux, we find that TOM-CC switches reversibly between three states of ion permeability associated with protein diffusion. While freely diffusing TOM-CC molecules are predominantly in a high permeability state, non-mobile molecules are mostly in an intermediate or low permeability state. We explain this behavior by the mechanical binding of the two protruding Tom22 subunits to the hydrogel and a concomitant combinatorial opening and closing of the two β-barrel pores of TOM-CC. TOM-CC could thus represent a β-barrel membrane protein complex to exhibit membrane state-dependent mechanosensitive properties, mediated by its two Tom22 subunits.

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Single-molecule FRET imaging of beta-barrel folding. In comparison to globular proteins, the spontaneous folding and insertion of β-barrel membrane proteins is surprisingly slow, typically occurring on the order of minutes. Using single-molecule Förster Resonance Energy Transfer to report on the folding of fluorescently-labelled Outer Membrane Protein G we measured the real-time insertion of a β-barrel membrane protein from an unfolded state. Folding events were rare, and fast (<20 ms); occurring immediately upon arrival at the membrane. This combination of infrequent, but rare, folding resolves this apparent dichotomy between slow ensemble kinetics, and the typical timescales of biomolecular folding.

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Raj Paul Raj joins us as a Newton-Bhabha research internship as part of his PhD programme in IACS, India. He brings synthetic ion channels for single channel electrophysiology and single molecule imaging in Droplet Interface Bilayers.