Professor Tuomas Knowles

Professor of Physical Chemistry and Biophysics

1920 Professor of Physical Chemistry

Our research

We study the physical and chemical aspects of the behaviour of biopolymers and other soft systems. Much of our work has been focused on the physical aspects underlying the self-assembly of protein molecules. Self-organisation is the driving force generating complex matter in nature, and the process by which the machinery providing functionality in living systems is assembled. The goal of our research is to understand the physical and chemical factors which control the structures and dynamics of biomolecular assemblies, and the connections between the nanoscale characteristics of the component molecules and the physical properties of large-scale assemblies and their behaviour on a mesoscopic to macroscopic scale. The techniques used in our laboratory include biosensors, optical lithography, microfluidic devices and scanning probe microscopy and spectroscopy. We work both with natural and synthetic polymers and our interests range from fundamental chemical physics to technological applications in material science and molecular medicine.

Watch Professor Knowles discuss his research

Take a tour of the Sir Rodney Sweetnam laboratory

Publications

Oligomers of Heat-Shock Proteins: Structures That Don’t Imply Function

WM Jacobs, TPJ Knowles, D Frenkel

– PLoS Comput Biol

(2016)

12,

e1004756

(doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004756)

Kinetic model of the aggregation of alpha-synuclein provides insights into prion-like spreading

M Iljina, GA Garcia, MH Horrocks, L Tosatto, ML Choi, KA Ganzinger, AY Abramov, S Gandhi, NW Wood, N Cremades, CM Dobson, TPJ Knowles, D Klenerman

– Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

(2016)

113,

E1206

(doi: 10.1073/pnas.1524128113)

Consistent Treatment of Hydrophobicity in Protein Lattice Models Accounts for Cold Denaturation

E van Dijk, P Varilly, TPJ Knowles, D Frenkel, S Abeln

– Physical Review Letters

(2016)

116,

078101

(doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.078101)

Neuroscience: An anticancer drug suppresses the primary nucleation reaction that initiates the production of the toxic Ab42 aggregates linked with Alzheimer's disease

J Habchi, P Arosio, M Perni, AR Costa, M Yagi-Utsumi, P Joshi, S Chia, SIA Cohen, MBD Müller, S Linse, EAA Nollen, CM Dobson, TPJ Knowles, M Vendruscolo

– Science Advances

(2016)

e1501244

(doi: 10.1126/sciadv.1501244)

Automated Ex Situ Assays of Amyloid Formation on a Microfluidic Platform.

K-L Saar, EV Yates, T Müller, S Saunier, CM Dobson, TPJ Knowles

– Biophysical journal

(2016)

110,

555

(doi: 10.1016/j.bpj.2015.11.3523)