Research Symposium

BIO

Hello!
My name is Olivia; I am a third-year undergraduate student studying biochemistry. I am originally from Upstate New York but came to Florida five years ago and reside in Panama City Beach. I want to pursue a Ph.D. in biochemistry one day and work in a lab somewhere. For lab work/research, I would love to be a part of finding alternative medicines for women with Perimenopause ER+ (positive for Estrogen Receptors) breast cancer.

The Photochemistry of Cholesta-5,7,9(11)-trien-3-ol in a Medium that Mimics Biological Conditions.

Abstract

Cholesterol (CHOL) is essential for membrane structure. It can determine the membrane's permeability, trafficking, and signal transduction, among other functions. It is challenging to study cholesterol directly, so most derivatives are used as probes to determine how CHOL works in the cell. This research concerns cholesta-5,7,9(11)-trien-3-ol (CTL) that differs from CTL by only two double bonds. Although CTL has been used as a fluorescent probe to study CHOL tracking in vivo, its photochemistry in biological or biomimetic media is unknown. What was established in our laboratory is that CTL gives rearrangement and addition/reduction photoproducta in aprotic and protic solvents, respectively. Whether these products form in biomimetic media is not known, nor is their possible toxicity. For initial measurements we selected multilamellar vesicles (MLVs) as the biomimetic medium with CTL and HOCTL incorporated in the membrane. Previous studies in our laboratory lead us to expect that we should be able to follow the product evolution by UV and fluorescence spectroscopies.

Keywords: Photochemistry, Photophysics, Biochemistry