Project description
Unique optical fingerprints will help scientists track individual molecules
Fluorescent probes have significantly advanced medical science and basic research, acting like beacons in the night to call attention to molecules of interest in vivo and in vitro. However, it is not possible with these conventional probes to tell tagged molecules apart; only to view the group as a whole. The EU-funded SRCV project is creating a molecular device capable of generating an optical 'fingerprint' upon binding – a unique pattern of fluorescence arising from different intensities and/or positions of the bands of each chromophore in the sensor. SRCV is going to use the device to track self-replicating molecules in low concentrations in cell-like compartments. The technology will overcome current barriers to tracking the evolution of these molecules in 'protocell' environments relevant to probing the origin of life.
Objective
Unravelling the origin of life and achieving the de-novo synthesis of life are among the grand challenges in contemporary science. Self-replicating molecules play a central role in addressing these challenges. Progress in the field of self-replication is hampered by limitations in monitoring the replication process in real-time, particularly when using low concentrations and small sample volumes (i.e. in protocell environments). Here we propose to employ, for the first time, a new optical pattern-generating combinatorial fluorescent molecular device (expertise of the Experienced Researcher) for the real-time monitoring of the dynamic evolution of self-replicating molecules (expertise of the Host Lab). The binding of the sensor to the self-replicators affects the intensity and/or position of the bands of each of the chromophores contained in the sensor at different emission channels, thus generating a unique optical fingerprint (fluorescent pattern) for each self-replicator. The method allows optical identification and tracking of self-replicators in real-time and requires only small sample volumes. The latter characteristic allows self-replication to be monitored inside cell-like compartments (coascervate droplet or bilayer vesicles), enabling, for the first time, to study replication inside such compartments. Merging replication with compartmentalization constitute an important towards developing a minimal form of life. Furthermore, compartmentalization in small volumes allows large numbers of experiments to be conducted in parallel, which would, for the first time, enable studying stochastic effects important for evolution of synthetic self-replicators.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensors
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Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
MSCA-IF-EF-ST - Standard EFCoordinator
9712CP Groningen
Netherlands