Abstract: Light scattering-based microscopy has made significant progress over the past decade, reaching the single molecule level both for resonant and non-resonant detection. We have been approaching the challenge of ultrasensitive detection through interferometric scattering microscopy (iSCAT), and more recently mass photometry (MP). MP enables not only the detection of single biomolecules without labels, it does so with sufficient accuracy to measure the molecular mass of individual species with high levels of resolution and precision. I will introduce both iSCAT and MP in the context of interference techniques more broadly, and explain the key technological steps enabling the current levels of detection sensitivity and measurement precision. I will then illustrate the reach of mass photometry by demonstrating its applicability to both nucleic acids and membrane proteins in addition to lipids, sugars and polypeptides, thereby covering the majority of biomolecules. Combination of this broad applicability with the ability to accurately determine the relative amounts of species in complex mixtures without the need for labels or other sample modifications results in a universal method to study interaction stoichiometries, energetics and kinetics. Taken together, these results establish mass photometry as an extremely powerful, solution-based, label-free, yet single molecule method to quantify and thereby study biomolecular structure and interactions.
Biography: Philipp Kukurais is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Oxford, leading an interdisciplinary research group supported by ERC Starting and Consolidator grants that focusses on the development and application of new optical methodologies to study biomolecular structure, dynamics and interactions. His main contributions have been the development of femtosecond stimulated Raman spectroscopy (FSRS) and interferometric scattering microscopy (iSCAT), in particular in the context of label-free detection and mass measurement of individual biomolecules. Recent awards include those by the RSC(Harrison Meldola 2011 and Marlow 2015), the European Biophysical Society Association (Young Investigator Medal 2017), a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award (2018), the Klung-Wilhemy Award (2018)and theUK Blavatnik Award in Chemistry(2019).
Read More