Biophysics
BIOPHYSICS: from molecules to organisms and beyond
Unit 1: Syllabus, Introduction, Historical overview: Harvey and Newton; Galvani; Pauling and Corey; Franklin, Wilkins, Watson, Crick: The Path to the Double Helix; Hodgkin and Huxley; The Rise of the New Biology.
Unit 2: Molecular Biophysics, Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics of Biopolymers: Atoms and Molecules, Proteins and Nucleic Acids, Molecular Forces in Biological Structures, Energetics and Dynamics.
Unit 3: Molecular Biophysics, the basis of macromolecular function. Functional implications of molecular structures, kinetics of enzymatic and diffusional processes, molecular interactions and complex processes. ribosome, ion channels.
Unit 4: Cellular Biophysics, Physics of Membrane Potentials, Active and Passive Transport, Conductance, Action potentials.
Unit 5: Cellular Biophysics, Molecular motors, contraction, cell movement.
Unit 6: Overview of Experimental biophysics: X-ray diffraction and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy, Electron microscopy, Live cell imaging, Single Molecule Biophysics, Patch Clamp, Fluorescence spectroscopy, circular dichroism, calorimetry and separations methods, Next Generation Sequencing, gene chips and protein arrays, mass spectrometry.
Unit 7: Computational Biophysics: Molecular Dynamics, Monte-Carlo simulation, Structural Bioinformatics, Structure prediction, Computer Aided Drug Design, Pathways, Metabolic Engineering, Cellular Organelles, Cell Mechanics, Multicellular Simulations
Unit 8: Organismal Biophysics, Mechanics: Biomechanics of the Cardiovascular system, Mechanical Properties of Muscles.
Unit 9: Organismal Biophysics, Neurobiophysics: The Nervous System, Sensory mechanisms: Sound and Acoustics - Biophysics of hearing; Optics - biophysics of vision, etc.
Unit 10: Environmental Biophysics (global warming, etc), biophysics of networks, and the Physics Basis of Energy Medicine. September 27, 2008
Optional Reading:
BOOKS
Biophysical Chemistry Part II, Techniques for the study of biological structure and function, by Charles Cantor and Paul Schimmel (1980)
Biophysical Chemistry: Part I: The Conformation of Biological Macromolecules by Paul R Schimmel
Biophysical Chemistry: Part III: The Behavior of Biological Macromolecules by Charles R Cantor
Biochemistry by Lupert Stryer (1988).
Principles of Physical Biochemistry by K.E. van Holde, W. C. Johnson, and P.S. Ho;
Neurodynamix by W.O. Friesen and J.A. Friesen.
Photosynthesis Photobiochemistry and Photobiophysics By Bacon Ke
Zoological Physics: Quantitative Models of Body Design, Actions, and Physical Limitations of Animals by Boye K. Ahlborn
Tribology & Biophysics of Artificial Joints, Volume 50 (Tribology and Interface Engineering Series) (Hardcover) by L.S.Pinchuk, V.I. Nikolaev, E.A. Tsvetkov, V.A.Goldade
Psychophysics: the fundamentals by Gescheider G (1997). 3rd, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates
The Biophysics Basis for Acupuncture and Health, by Shin Yin Lo.
Cross Currents By Robert O. Becker
Virtual Medicine: A New Dimension in Energy Healing By Keith Scott-Mumby
The Body Electric: An Anatomy of the New Bionic Senses By: James Geary
The Biology Of Belief: Unleashing The Power Of Consciousness, Matter And Miracles By Bruce H. Lipton
Calm Healing: Methods for a New Era of Medicine By Robert Bruce Newman, Ruth L. Miller
ARTICLES
The Psychophysics of Taste. (Am. J. Clin. Nutr, 1978)
Psychophysics of oral sensation (taste and smell, Adv Otorhinolaryngol. 2006)
Hearing Biophysics lesson ( EHP online journal)
Biomechanics: Human jaw and Muscle modeling (2007)
Dynamics of small-world networks (Nature, 1998)
When Physics Trumps Hysteria in Global Warming (2007)
The ion channel inverse problem: neuroinformatics meets biophysics (PLoS Comput Biol. 2006)
Widescale Biodiesel Production from Algae by Michael Briggs (2004)
Synthetic Life by W.W.Gibbs /Scientific American, 2004/
Useful Links:
Molecular Structure and Behavior