nai

Project Progress

Andy Boal’s project at UH-NAI is concerned with developing a concise, molecular level understanding of how biomolecular structure allows microorganisms to adapt to various extreme aqueous environments. The specific question we are asking is: Are there identifiable protein motifs that allow for protein stability, and therefore organism survivability, which are adapted to function in particular environments? We are attempting to answer this question by applying a suite of techniques that include the development of proteomic databases, design and study of protein model molecules, and molecular characterization of extreme environments.

My group has developed a set of computational tools to support this research, called the Salt Bridge Statistical Analyzer (SBSA). At the most basic level, SBSA allows us to quickly perform statistical analyses of proteomic databases; for example, identifying and counting instances of protein motif classes that meet certain contextual constraints. We have also developed a program that uses a genetic algorithm to learn the features associated with protein stability in extreme environments.