Upgraded D22 SEC-SANS setup dedicated to the biology community.

Described here is the current status of the upgraded size-exclusion chromatography (SEC) system implemented with the D22 small-angle neutron scattering (SANS) instrument at the Institut Laue-Langevin. Since its initial proof of principle in 2016, this SEC-SANS arrangement has been continuously requested by the user community, leading to the design of an upgraded version. A detailed description of the setup and its control is provided, and a few examples of protein structural investigations are presented, which will highlight the various possibilities and limitations of the setup to optimize experimental success.

Small-angle x-ray and neutron scattering of MexR and its complex with DNA supports a conformational selection binding model.

In this work, we used small-angle x-ray and neutron scattering to reveal the shape of the protein-DNA complex of the Pseudomonas aeruginosa transcriptional regulator MexR, a member of the multiple antibiotics resistance regulator (MarR) family, when bound to one of its native DNA binding sites. Several MarR-like proteins, including MexR, repress the expression of efflux pump proteins by binding to DNA on regulatory sites overlapping with promoter regions. When expressed, efflux proteins self-assemble to form multiprotein complexes and actively expel highly toxic compounds out of the host organism.

Hydrogen-Deuterium exchange kinetics in β-lactoglobulin (-)-epicatechin complexes studied by FTIR spectroscopy.

Hydrogen-Deuterium exchange kinetics of β-lactoglobulin and β-lactoglobulin (-)-epicatechin solutions has been investigated through the analysis of the amide I absorption band at 1650cm in the FTIR spectrum. H-D substitution in NH amides and residues of the protein results in a slight red-shift and in intensity changes of the amide I components: either these effects have been inspected in the framework of the Principal Components Analysis methods. The present analysis allowed to unveil three H-D kinetics at the timescale of the oligomeric fluctuations of the protein.