Ferritin Journal

Week 1: May 1 - May 3

We examined three problems related to ferritin. Firstly, we investigated protein isolation of ferritin. We are considering the protocols created by Santambrogio et al. (1993), as they have been used by multiple other authors as well. This paper uses precipitation followed by column chromatography, and verification with spectroscopy, PAGE and SDS-PAGE (Levi 1994). Alternatively, we may consider using his-tags for Ni-NTA column purification. Secondly, we examined the feasibility of using magnetism to manipulate ferritin. Commercial horse spleen ferritin was tested on a Dynabead rack, and as expected, it did not move, as the core should not be magnetic. We must thus synthesize magnetoferritin wherein the native ferrihydrite core is converted to magnetite--a paramagnetic material which can be attracted to magnetic fields (Jordan et al. 2010, Wong et al. 1998). We were able to attain some general knowledge of magnetism in nano-scale material, including a basic understanding of blocking temperatures, superparamagnetism and magnetic moments, all magnetism-related measurements. But we are ill-equipped to model this system theoretically in terms of calculated forces. We also explore the possibility of alternative magnetic particles, in the case ferritin is too small to exhibit magnetic forces significant enough to move proteins. Magnetosomes were found to be much larger, but unviable due to the complexity of their creation. The CCMV virus may also be an option, although there is currently little known about it and therefore further research into this topic is required. (Lohsse et al. 2011). Because we also intend to scaffold proteins to ferritin as in our TALE DNA-binding proteins, we looked into fusions to both C- and N-terminals of ferritin. The N- and C- termini of ferritin subunits are present on the outside and inside of the nanoparticle respectively, and therefore N-terminal fusions are an obvious choice to ensure TALEs are present on the exterior of the nanoparticles (Dorner et al. 1985).

Week 2: May 6 - May 10

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Week 3: May 13 - May 17

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Week 4: May 20 - May 24

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Week 5: May 27 - May 31

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Week 6: June 3 - June 7

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Week 7: June 10 - June 14

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Week 8: June 17 - June 21

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Week 9: June 24 - June 28

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Week 10: July 1 - July 5

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Week 11: July 8 - July 12

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Week 12: July 15 - July 19

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Week 13: July 22 - July 26

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Week 14: July 29 - August 2

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Week 15: August 5 - August 9

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Week 16: August 12 - August 16

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Week 17: August 19 - August 23

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Week 18: August 26 - August 30

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Week 19: September 2 - September 6

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Week 20: September 9 - September 13

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Week 21: September 16 - September 20

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Week 22: September 23 - September 27

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Week 23: September 30 - October 4

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