EPR spectroscopic investigations of radicals in complex metalloproteins

This is one of two fully funded PhD positions available in the Roessler research group as part of the Centre for Pulse EPR spectroscopy (PEPR) that is being built on the White City Campus at Imperial College London, supported by a £2.3 M grant from the EPSRC. The Roessler group investigates unpaired electrons in redox reactions that underpin essential chemical reactions in respiration and photosynthesis by applying state-of-the-art pulse EPR techniques [1] to understand the mechanisms of challenging enzymes that cannot be obtained in high concentrations and require precise electrochemical potential adjustment [2]. More recently, the group has been developing film-electrochemical EPR spectroscopy (FE-EPR), an exciting technique for studying the evolution of radicals during a reaction [3]. FE-EPR allows the accurate determination of the redox potentials of buried redox centres within enzymes and their activity during catalysis. PEPR combines state-of-the-art pulse EPR at X- and Q-band frequencies with FE-EPR and instrument development in collaboration with University College London and the London Centre of Nanotechnology.

Project 2

In this project, you will apply the state-of-art instrumentation available at PEPR to complex biological systems, such as metal-centered redox processes occurring in cells as well as in membrane proteins reconstituted into artificial membrane systems. For this project, either a background or an interest in biochemistry will be helpful.

We are looking to recruit an outstanding Masters level graduate in Chemistry or a related subject. The PhD studentships are fully funded for 3.5 years. Please see http://www.imperial.ac.uk/roessler-lab/ for further details on current research and a full list of recent publications. The PhD student will primarily be based in the Molecular Sciences Research Hub, the new research home for the Department of Chemistry at Imperial’s White City campus, with access to further research facilities, e.g. SPIN-Lab, at the South Kensington Campus.