A recent discovery in membrane research is the ability of synthetic amphipathic polymers of styrene and maleic acid to solubilize membranes in the form of nanodiscs. These "native nanodiscs" form a promising new tool to study membrane proteins. In this project you will use well-defined model membrane systems as well as biological membranes to study the importance of chemical and physical properties of the polymers for the efficiency of solubilization and for properties of the resulting nanodiscs, such as size, homogeneity, stability and lipid packing. In addition you will explore novel applications of SMA-bounded nanodiscs as platform to study membrane proteins and protein/lipid interactions.
