Rhodopsin proteins as voltage sensors

Rhodopsins are fluorescent membrane proteins that absorb photons and use their energy to power proton transport. 15 years ago, it was discovered that the fluorescence intensity of rhodopsin proteins is dependent on membrane voltage. This allows us to use them as tools to detect electrical signals in neurons via light microscopy, which has revolutionized the field of neuroscience. A lot of research has gone into protein engineering of these voltage sensitive rhodopsins. However, the full potential of these proteins for voltage measurement has not yet been reached, partly because the current understanding of how they work is limited.

We have collected a large dataset of rhodopsin mutants of which we know fluorescent properties as well as proton pumping behaviour, and we would like to use this data using computational biology techniques in the fields of molecular dynamics, machine learning and bioinformatics. In this project you will be applying a variety of computational techniques to help understand and engineer voltage sensitive fluorescent proteins. You will learn how to handle large amounts of data and carry out high performance computations on the supercomputer, DelftBlue.

The project will be co-supervised by Marco Post and Stefan Loonen, PhD candidates in Brinks and Sostaric groups.