Essentials of Chemical Biology (eBook)

Andrew Miller Imperial College Genetic Therapies Centre, Department of Chemistry, Imperial College London, UK Julian Tanner Department of Biochemistry, The University of Hong Kong

Preface.

Glossary of physical terms.

1. The structures of biological macromolecules and lipid
assemblies.

1.1. General introduction.

1.2. Protein structure.

1.3. Carbohydrate structure.

1.4. Nucleic acid structure.

1.5. Macromolecular lipid assemblies.

1.6. Structural forces in biological macromolecules.

2. Chemical and biological synthesis.

2.1. Introduction to synthesis in chemical biology.

2.2. Chemical synthesis of peptides and proteins.

2.3. Chemical synthesis of nucleic acids.

2.4. Chemical synthesis of oligosaccharides.

2.5. Chemical synthesis of lipids.

2.6. Biological synthesis of biological macromolecules.

2.7. Directed biological synthesis of proteins.

2.8. Biological syntheses of nucleic acids, oligosaccharides and
lipids.

3. Molecular biology as a toolset for chemical
biology.

3.1. Key concepts in molecular biology.

3.2. Tools and techniques in molecular biology.

3.3. Cloning and identification of genes in DNA.

3.4. Integrating cloning and expression.

3.5. Site-directed mutagenesis

4. Electronic and vibrational spectroscopy.

4.1. Electronic and vibrational spectroscopy in chemical
biology.

4.2. UV-visible spectroscopy.

4.3. Circular dichroism spectroscopy.

4.4. Vibrational spectroscopy.

4.5. Fluorescence spectroscopy.

4.6. Probing metal centres by absorption spectroscopy.

5. Magnetic resonance.

5.1. Magnetic resonance in chemical biology.

5.2. Key principles of NMR.

5.3. Two-dimensional NMR.

5.4. Multi-dimensional NMR.

5.5. Biological macromolecule structural information.

5.6. EPR spectroscopy; key principles.

6. Diffraction and microscopy.

6.1. Diffraction and microscopy in chemical biology.

6.2. Key principles of X-ray diffraction.

6.3. Structural information from X-ray diffraction.

6.4. Neutron diffraction.

6.5. Key principles of electron microscopy.

6.6. Key principles of scanning probe microscopy.

7. Molecular recognition and binding.

7.1. Molecular recognition and binding in chemical biology.

7.2. Theoretical models of binding.

7.3. Analysing molecular recognition and binding.

7.4. Biological molecular recognition studies.

8. Kinetics and catalysis.

8.1. Catalysis in chemical biology.

8.2. Steady state kinetic schemes.

8.3. Pre-steady-state kinetics.

8.4. Theories of biocatalysis.

8.5. Electron transfer.

9. Mass spectrometry and proteomics.

9.1. Mass spectrometry in chemical biology.

9.2. Key principles in mass spectrometry.

9.3. Structural analysis of biological macromolecules and lipids
by mass spectrometry.

9.4. The challenge of proteomics.

9.5. Genomics - assigning function to genes and proteins.

10. Molecular selection and evolution.

10.1. Chemical biology and the origins of life.

10.2. Molecular breeding; natural selection acting on
self-organisation.

10.3. Directed evolution of protein function.

10.4. Directed evolution of nucleic acids.

10.5. Catalytic antibodies.

References.

Index.

"Essentials in Chemical Biology is a valuable resource not only for chemistry students who are venturing into and interested in biological systems, but also biochemistry and biology students who want a fundamental understanding of the physical and chemical basis of biology and the techniques used in its study.? (Chemistry World, August 2009)

"The succinct and lucid presentation style of Essentials Of Chemical Biology will likely make it a popular resource for undergraduate and graduate students interested in the structure and interaction of biologically relevant macromolecules." (Journal of Chemical Biology, February 2009)

"This excellent work fills the need for an upper-level graduate course resource that examines the latest biochemical, biophysical, and molecular biological methods for analyzing the structures and physical properties of biomolecules. Miller (Imperial College London, UK) and Tanner (Univ. of Hong Kong) cover traditional subjects such as binding interactions and catalysis. They also describe biophysical theories and current methods for protein structure determinations such as circular dichroism, X-ray crystallography, neutron diffraction, NMR, EPR, fluorescence, mass spectrometry, and electron and atomic force microscopy. For example, the chapter on solution NMR provides simplified yet high-quality explanations of the key principles of NMR. The well-developed introduction helps students to better follow the more complex information concerning the principles of multidimensional NMR. In addition, the latter part of the chapter offers current applications using a variety of multidimensional NMR spectroscopy experiments in the analysis of proteins, nucleic acid, carbohydrate, and lipid structures. This reviewer showed Essentials of Chemical Biology to several of his senior graduate students, and they unanimously gave the book rave reviews. The work could be improved by better referencing the resource materials within the text and by providing student exercises at the end of each chapter." (J. M. Tomich, Kansas State University, Choice, February 2009)

"This book seems to fit our needs very well, I would certainly
recommend it. I would consider changing the course to reflect
material in this book"

-Dr RJ Cox, University of Bristol

"Worth pursuing as an excellent text for structural aspects.
Would be very good for postgraduate courses as well"

-Dr N. Botting, University of St Andrews

"Very much worth pursuing. The structure and dynamics approach
is most welcome. The proposed text seems to address the omissions
of several current texts. This could be the winner for our needs. A
recent massive investment in bioinformatics and chemoinformatics
means that modelling of structure (& recognition) and
manipulation and visualisation of complex molecules is a real
teaching possibility for evolving courses"

-Karl Hemming, University of Hertfordshire

"Certainly there is a need for this type of text - its coverage
is very comprehensive. A book like this would certainly allow
development of existing courses or creation of new ones."

-Dr GA Nickolas, Manchester Met University

"Will be a good new addition to current texts."

-Dr J. Gardiner, UMIST

"I find the overall philosophy and content of the proposed work
both exciting and admirable. As far as I am aware, there is no book
on the market with a similar coverage. I wish the authors well and
think that this is a timely and worthwhile enterprise."

-Dr. Brian Ridge, University of Exeter