Biophysical Mechanisms

Much of the scientific success of biophysics depends upon its ability to develop detailed physical mechanisms to explain specific biological processes. The double helical structure of DNA, for example, provides a framework for an explanation of how genetic material is replicated and of how genetic mutations arise: specific proteins mediate the unwinding of the DNA duplex and the assembly of a new strand based on complementary base pairing of the four DNA bases, guanine with cytosine and adenine with thymine; mismatch of one of these base pairs generates a complementary strand with a single base substitution (a mutation). The value of this, and a variety of other biophysical mechanisms, is unlimited for human knowledge in general and for biomedical research in particular.

Biomedicine

• HHMI’s BioInteractive is an educational site for middle school to college/university level with information on cancer, neuroscience, biological clocks, infectious diseases, DNA & RNA, etc., generated and maintained by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
   

Electrical Behavior of Cells

• Recent Advances in Nuclear Electrophysiology, Jose Omar Bustamante. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
        

Energy Transduction in Membranes (Edited by W.A. Cramer)

• Thermodynamics Of Energy Transduction In Biological Membranes, William A. Cramer and Glenda M. Soriano. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
   
• Thermodynamics Of The Excited States Of Photosynthesis, Jerome Lavergne and Pierre Joliot. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
   
• Photosynthetic Reaction Centers, John H. Golbeck. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
   
• Bacteriorhodopsin, Janos Lanyi. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
   

Protein Function

• Enzyme Catalysis, Theresa Knapp Holtzclaw. Background and protocols for a high school level experiment on enzyme function. Site maintained by Pearson/Prentice Hall.
   
• Allosteric Mechanisms in the Activation of Ligand-Gated Channels, Meyer Jackson. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
   

Membrane Behavior

• Permeation as a Diffusion Process, Bob Eisenberg. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
   
• Surface Charge, Gerald Ehrenstein. Previously published in Biophysics Textbook Online.
   
• Teaching Active Transport At the Turn of the Twenty-First Century: Recent Discoveries and Conceptual Changes, Giuseppe Inesi. Previously published in Biophysical Journal and reprinted in Biophysics Textbook Online. 
   

Muscle Contraction and Cell Motility

• The Myosin Home Page – Hosted by the Myosin Group at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology and the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research 
   

Protein Folding

• Unraveling the Mystery of Protein Folding, W.A. (Bill) Thomasson. Breakthroughs in Bioscience article from FASEB, the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology.
   
• Folding@Home Distributed Computing Project – “Folding@Home is a distributed computing project which studies protein folding, misfolding, aggregation, and related diseases. We use novel computational methods and large scale distributed computing, to simulat timescales thousands to millions of times longer than previously achieved.” This site provides information about protein folding and its importance and provides software for personal computers that allows individuals to participate in the protein folding computing process.
   

Sensation

• The molecular design of visual transduction, D.M. Horrigan, C.L. Makino.
   
• Promenade Round the Cochlea, a delightful educational site with excellent graphics on the physiology and biophysics of the ear; generated and maintained by the University of Montpellier.