Department of Physics at the U of I

Biological Physics

Myosin V Walks Hand-Over-Hand: Single Fluorophore Imaging with 1.5-nm Localization. Read the abstract.
Photo from the cover of Science magazine, June 2003

What is Biological Physics?

In 1944, physicist Erwin Schrödinger published a short book, What is Life?, that changed the course of modern biology.

Could the behavior of a living organism be explained solely by physics and chemistry? Yes, it could, Schrödinger answered. "The obvious inability of present-day physics and chemistry to account for such events," he wrote, "is no reason at all for doubting that they can be accounted for by those sciences."

It's a sentiment that has lured generations of physical scientists to biology.

For the past half-century, researchers have applied the rigorous tools of physics to help answer Schrödinger's question and unravel the fundamental mechanisms of life, but some of the most exciting challenges remain.

What Are We Doing With Biological Physics at the U of I?

The Experimental Biological Physics Research faculty's study includes, but is not limited to single-molecule methods, single-molecule fluorescence microscopy and spectroscopy, nucleic acid and protein translocases, DNA protein interactions, molecular biology, structure and dynamics of biological macromolecules.

The Theoretical and Computational Biological Physics Research faculty's study includes such ideas as biomolecular modeling of molecular motors, multiscale modeling of pattern formation, photosynthesis, cellular mechanics, multiscale modeling of cells and bionanotechnology.

Faculty

Aksimentiev, Aleksei Associate Professor 263 Loomis Laboratory 217.333.6495	Chemla, Yann R Assistant Professor 161 Loomis Laboratory 217.333.6501
Clegg, Robert M Professor 301A Loomis Laboratory 217.244.8143	Goldenfeld, Nigel Professor 3113 Engineering Sciences Building 217.333.8027
Granick, Steve Professor of Physics (0%) Professor of Materials Science and Eng. 1022 Seitz Materials Research Lab 217.333.5720	Gruebele, Martin H Professor of Physics (0%) Professor of Chemistry and Physics A220 Chemical and Life Sci Lab 217.333.1624
Ha, Taekjip Professor 133 Loomis Laboratory 217.265.0717	Luthey-Schulten, Zaida A Professor of Physics (0%) Professor of Chemistry A544 Chemical and Life Sci Lab 217.333.3518
Oono, Yoshitsugu Professor 3111 Engineering Sciences Building 217.333.2996	Schulten, Klaus J Professor 3147 Beckman Institute 217.244.1604
Selvin, Paul R Professor 365 Loomis Laboratory 217.244.3371	Stack, John D Professor 437B Loomis Laboratory 217.333.4357
Woese, Carl R Professor of Physics (0%) Professor of Microbiology 3112 Institute for Genomic Biology 217.333.9369	Yodh, Jaya G Research Assistant Professor 320 Loomis Laboratory 217.244.1155
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