Abstract
This is a review of relevant Raman spectroscopy (RS) techniques and their use in structural biology, biophysics, cells, and tissues imaging towards development of various medical diagnostic tools, drug design, and other medical applications. Classical and contemporary structural studies of different water-soluble and membrane proteins, DNA, RNA, and their interactions and behavior in different systems were analyzed in terms of applicability of RS techniques and their complementarity to other corresponding methods. We show that RS is a powerful method that links the fundamental structural biology and its medical applications in cancer, cardiovascular, neurodegenerative, atherosclerotic, and other diseases. In particular, the key roles of RS in modern technologies of structure-based drug design are the detection and imaging of membrane protein microcrystals with the help of coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering (CARS), which would help to further the development of protein structural crystallography and would result in a number of novel high-resolution structures of membrane proteins—drug targets; and, structural studies of photoactive membrane proteins (rhodopsins, photoreceptors, etc.) for the development of new optogenetic tools. Physical background and biomedical applications of spontaneous, stimulated, resonant, and surface- and tip-enhanced RS are also discussed. All of these techniques have been extensively developed during recent several decades. A number of interesting applications of CARS, resonant, and surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy methods are also discussed.
Highlights
Raman spectroscopy (RS) is an experimental method for detecting molecular vibrations, or other excitations, such as rotational modes, energy gap in superconductors, etc
Raman mapping is a method of obtaining of two-dimensional (2D) or 3D object images where each point corresponds to the numerical value of the chosen Raman spectral feature that were obtained across the sample surface [62]
The plate-like crystals were grown in bicelles structure at Gloeobacter rhodopsin (GR), cyanobacterial proton pump that can be potentially used in optogenetics and performed RS and time-resolved laser spectroscopy in the visible range to probe the GR dark state and the photocycle in the crystals
Summary
Raman spectroscopy (RS) is an experimental method for detecting molecular vibrations, or other excitations, such as rotational modes, energy gap in superconductors, etc. We show that Raman scattering is highly efficient when it is used complementarily with other techniques for structural studies of membrane proteins and protein complexes (X-ray diffraction on synchrotron sources, XFEL, cryo-EM, etc.). Raman scattering is a sensitive and selective method for studying molecular bonds, conformation, and environments, and it is a promising non-invasive technique for biomedical applications [36]. We discuss RS studies in a wide variety of fields, including protein crystallography, protein, DNA and lipid dynamics, microscopy, cell and tissue imaging, diagnostics, and therapeutic applications, and they provide a background for understanding the fundamentals of RS
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