Our laboratory is interested in the biomolecular condensation. Biomolecular condensates are observable in cells as the macrostructure of accumulated biopolymers such as proteins and nucleic acids. Recent studies revealed several molecular basics to undergo condensation, however, those researches are usually performed under in vitro conditions. Thus, how certain groups of molecules are condensed in a spatio-temporally specific manner is unclear. Another interest is the chiral effect in the regulation of biomolecular condensation. Several studies showed that the assembly of macromolecules is affected by the chirality of the surrounding environment, indicating that the effect of achiral amino acids on condensation is possibly existing.
Our laboratory is challenging to answer this question by using 1) a Mass spectrometric approach and informatics to reveal the spatio-temporal composition of biomolecular condensates and 2) a spectroscopic approach (e.g. NMR, fluorescent microscopy) to decipher the regulatory mechanisms of such ”ordered recruitment” in molecular level, including the effect of chirality on it.