Dr. Markéta Schmidt Černohorská from CENAB will give a lecture at the Faculty of Science, Charles University
The Department of Physical and Macromolecular Chemistry at the Faculty of Science, Charles University, invites you to a lecture tomorrow by Markéta Schmidt Černohorská, M.A., Ph.D., who works at the Center for Nanomaterials and Biotechnology (CENAB) at our faculty. The lecture begins at 2:00 p.m. and is titled “Confined Nucleation and Polymer Anchoring: A Biophysical View of the Centrosome.”
The centrosome is the primary organizing center of microtubules in animal cells, yet from a physical standpoint, it presents a mechanical paradox: how can a viscoelastic hydrogel without a boundary membrane structurally anchor and organize rigid polymers with gigapascal stiffness (microtubules) and thus generate the enormous forces necessary for cell division?
In this lecture, “Spatially Confined Nucleation and Polymer Anchoring: A Biophysical Perspective on the Centrosome,” you will learn how the centrosome, as a complex supramolecular machine, is controlled, and the principles of phase separation, spatial confinement, and catalytic nucleation. You will explore how the centrosome functions as a “macromolecular reactor” that locally concentrates tubulin subunits to overcome the kinetic barriers of microtubule polymerization. You will then examine hypothetical biophysical models of whether the centrosome is a viscoelastic condensate that passively resists forces, or whether it possesses active mechanisms. Finally, you will discuss the role of the centriole—a chiral core that stabilizes the centrosome’s architecture against the active tension of the mitotic spindle.
The lecture by Markéta Schmidt Černohorská, Ph.D., will take place on Wednesday, March 11, at 2:00 p.m. at the Faculty of Science, Charles University in Prague.