{"id":1187,"date":"2010-07-10T08:48:00","date_gmt":"2010-07-10T08:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/?p=1187"},"modified":"2010-07-10T08:48:00","modified_gmt":"2010-07-10T08:48:00","slug":"the-nucleus-in-view","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/?p=1187","title":{"rendered":"The nucleus in view"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Delft Outlook, July 2010<\/em><\/p>\n

If you ask Dr David Gr\u00fcnwald what his specialism is, he will answer, \u201cVisualising molecules within the nucleus of a living cell.\u201d It takes a few moments for the significance of this simple statement to sink in.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Click image for .pdf download<\/em><\/strong>You can\u2019t see molecules with an optical microscope, can you? Surely they\u2019re far too small? Seeing molecules within a living cell could enable you to watch various processes of life as they happen. Apparently, it is indeed possible. Through observation, Gr\u00fcnwald has established that it takes 200 milliseconds for an RNA molecule to permeate the cell wall on its way out, while the average protein finds its way in within 5 to 10 milliseconds. \u201cThe best part was seeing how an RNA molecule would try various nuclear pores one after the other. It waits for a second or so at one, then moves on until it finds a pore that will actually let it in.\u201d
\nGr\u00fcnwald (34) can tell fascinating stories about the world which only a very few people, himself included, can make visible: the living complex that is a cell. Having studied law in Frankfurt for one year (\u201cI wanted to do something good for mankind, but studying law is not easy when you\u2019re dyslexic\u201d), he went on to study physics and was then introduced to biophysics. \u201cHow does life work? Not just as a description, but in the quantitative sense. How does a cell function and what principles keep life going? That question grabbed me and has never let me go.\u201d Since then, his glittering scientific career has seen him working at institutes of biophysics, biochemistry, molecular biology and medicine. After four years as a postdoctoral researcher at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, Gr\u00fcnwald decided it was time to return to physics.
\nWith the help of technicians and PhD students, he is now building his own microscope, which is specially designed to follow individual molecules. The crucial factor is ensuring the maximum possible light. The microscope, which is actually an open arrangement with lasers, a large-aperture lens, a colour-separation mirror and two ultra-sensitive cameras, will enable him to observe the interaction between various molecules with a precision of up to 30 nanometres. Fluorescence labelling can then be used to determine whether a virus is able to penetrate a nuclear pore, or the point at which a particular drug binds itself to the cell and how this affects the functioning of that cell. \u201cAll this happens within milliseconds,\u201d Gr\u00fcnwald says. \u201cThese processes are taking place in all our cells. We can see them happening. Not just on the outside of the cell \u2013 its \u2018envelope\u2019 \u2013 but in the nucleus itself.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you ask Dr David Gr\u00fcnwald what his specialism is, he will answer, \u201cVisualising molecules within the nucleus of a living cell.\u201d It takes a few moments for the significance of this simple statement to sink in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[66],"class_list":["post-1187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-delft-outlook","tag-bionano-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1187"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1187\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joswassink.nl\/insight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}