Kinetics of pHILIP Insertion into a Membrane with Varying Model Parameters

One of the features of pH Low Insertion Peptide (pHILIP) is to detect the level of pH in the extracellular environment and insert across the membrane as a helix when it senses low pH in the environment. By exploiting this feature, pHLIP can open new avenues in cancer diagnosis and treatment. To bring pHLIP technology to a reality, it is very important to know how long does a pHLIP molecule take to insert across the cell membrane. Two different time scales that account for the transformation of a pHILIP molecule from the coil to interfacial helix and the insertion of the helix into the membrane with transmembrane orientation are very important. This talk will mainly focus on kinetics of pHILIP insertion into a membrane with varying model parameters that control level of pH and value of pKa.