Ion Channel Gating and Biophysics

We have been studying the mechanism of gating in the Two-Pore Domain (K2P) family of K+ channels and the way in which their gating can be regulated by lipids and small molecules.  It is now clear these channels use a variety of structural mechanisms to open and close their pores, including changes within the selectivity filter itself.  This mechanism of filter gating is also known to occur in other members of this superfamily of tetrameric cation channels including the BK Calcium-activated K+ channel and Cyclic Nucleotide Gated (CNG) channels.  In the proposed project the student would have the opportunity to combine multiple different biophysical, computational, and functional approaches to investigate the structural mechanisms of filter gating in these channels and investigate what properties might be common amongst these channels.