Febs Letters Volume 103, Number 1-2./Volume 104, Number 1-2. [antikvár]

Volume 107, number 576 FEBS LETTERS July 1979 Meeting Report TRANSPORT BY PROTEINS A report of a symposium held at the University of Konstanz, West Germany, July 9-15, 1978* Horst SUND and Gideon BLAUER Fachbereich Biologie, Universität Konstanz, FRG and Institute of Life Sciences, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel Received 4 May 1979 Transport processes mediated by proteins are of fundamental biological importance and cover a broad spectrum of phenomena such as the transport of oxygen, protons, metal ions or the transport of ions through membranes. Each of these topics comprises a highly specialized field by itself. One of the main objectives of the symposium on 'Transport by Proteins' has been to provide a general basis for a meeting which would bring together workers from related fields, thus promoting mutual sthnulation and exchange of ideas and new techniques. Therefore, ample time was allocated for tlie discussion of the papers presented, preprints of which were available some time before the meeting. The pattern of the present symposium was similar to that of a previous conference on 'Protein-Ligand Interactions' (see FEBS Lett. (1975) 54, 1-4) which also had an interdisciplmary character. Financial support for the symposium was provided mainly by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and FEBS. The scientific program was based on 25 invited lectures which were divided into five sections. 1. General Two lectures were devoted to some fundamental aspects of thermodynamic principles relevant to ' The complete proceedings are being published together with the discussions in a book entitled Transport by Proteins, edited by G. Blauer and H. Sund, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin-New York, 1979 transport processes, emphasizing by several examples the importance of theoretical considerations. In a concise survey of some principles and methods based on reversible thermodynamics, continuous differential temperature titrations were selectively demonstrated as a tool for binding studies (Pohl, Konstanz). The growmg use of computerized analysis of thermodynamic data and advances in instrumentation were stressed. The second contribution dealt with applications of non-equilibrium thermodynamics to transport mechanisms mediated by proteins (Kedem, Rehovot). These were expressed by elementary cyclic processes which bridge between phenomenological description and model calculations. Two other lectures dealt with advanced spectroscopic methods demonstrating their possible use in the study of transport systems. Chemical relaxation methods such as temperature jump were used to elucidate kinetic details of proton and alkali ion transfer reactions across phospholipid membranes (Ruf, Oberbaumer and GreU, Frankfurt and Gottmgen). "C NMR measurements enabled observation of the time course of glycolysis in suspensions of Escherichia coli and allowed deductions on components and equilibria to be made (Shulman, Browm, Den Hollander and Ugurbil, Murray Hill, NJ). 2. Selected transport proteins Some of the 'classical' transport proteins and protein systems investigated for many years were included in this section, with special emphasis on new Elsevier !North-Holland Biomedical Press 1