Properties of nanoparticles (NP) in biological system strongly dependfrom the structure and stability of the proteins that interact with them. Unfortunately,this information is very difficult to obtain.Here we show that by using Synchrotron Radiation Circular Dichroism (SRCD)it is possible to detect changes in the secondary structure and stability ofdifferent classes of proteins upon interaction with nanoparticles. In some cases,it is also possible to identify the protein-nanoparticle interaction site byusing Nuclear Magnetic Resonance spectroscopy [1]. In particular, we show thatby using the SRCD beam line we can detect structural changes of proteins in thenanomolar concentration range when they form protein-nanoparticle complexes. Theadsorption of protein on NP modifies their melting point in a composition andsize dependent manner, indicating that the protein corona formation is stronglydepending on the nanoparticle physic chemical properties [1] Calzolai et al., Nano Lett. 2010, 10:3101-5.

Measuring protein structural and stability changes upon protein-nanoparticle interactions

243rd National Meeting (2012)

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