PhD: Phase transitions
and computation in living cells
Physicists have studied phase transitions seriously since the 19th century. We have studied how water freezes,
how iron becomes ferromagnetic, how mixtures of oil and water separate out into droplets of oil in water and many
other examples. Recently, many physicists have turned their attention to studying living cells. These are intricate
machines that burn energy, process information and do many other things using thousands of different types of nanomachines
(their protein molecules). They therefore provide a fascinating playground to see how nanomachines function and information
is processed by systems much less than the wavelength of light across.
This project will study one of these nanomachines: a protein called Dishevelled. The name comes from the effect errors in
this machine have on the hairs on fruit flies. There is strong recent (2005) evidence that Dishevelled phase separates into
high concentration domains called puncta actually in living cells. They are called puncta because they look like points of
light in the microscope. It has also been shown that this phase separation is vital for the biological function of Dishevelled.
Dishevelled is required for cells to process information (in the form of signals from other cells) during the development of
the human body from a single fertilised egg cell. The adult human body contains 100s of trillions of cells of 100s of different
types (nerve cells, muscle cells etc) but develops from a single cell. To do this the cells have to "talk" to each other so that cells in the head know to become nerve cells, cells in the kidney become kidney cells etc.
The project will involve using soft matter theoretical physics to model phase transitions inside a cell. It will investigate
how phase transitions can help a cell rcompute the appropriate
response to a signal.
The project is pure science not applied -- it is driven by curiosity.
See my
biological physics research page
for background info.
If you are interested and have or will soon get a first or upper second class degree in Physics or a related subject, please
email me at r.sear@surrey.ac.uk. Funding is available for UK students.
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