23M067 Yen Kwo Yung Lecture in Life Sciences – The Microscopic World of Proteins

Proteins are vitally important to living organisms. Malfunction of protein molecules, which perform most of the functions in our bodies, often leads to serious diseases. In addition, infection of microorganisms to human also involves protein molecules. For example, COVID-19 is the disease caused by a new coronavirus. Its infection pathway involves binding of the spike protein on the viral surface to the human receptor protein. So what do protein molecules look like, and how do they perform specific functions? The speaker will share with us the breakthroughs in biochemical research over the last few years, how we observe protein molecules at the nanometer scale and their functions at the nanosecond time scale.