{"id":75,"date":"2020-06-08T11:01:00","date_gmt":"2020-06-08T15:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/research.phys.cmu.edu\/biophysics\/?page_id=75"},"modified":"2026-09-15T14:49:45","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T18:49:45","slug":"research","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/research.phys.cmu.edu\/biophysics\/research\/","title":{"rendered":"Research"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Problems under study at the Biological Physics Group at Carnegie Mellon include: quantifying single cells\u2019 behaviors and sub-cellular structure and dynamics, biological information processing and control, physics of biological membranes, physical principles of membrane self-assembly, membrane-protein interactions, the molecular basis of cell signaling, mechanics of the cytoskeleton.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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Single-Cell Biophysics<\/span><\/h2>\n

A major challenge in biophysics is to decode the molecular processes underpinning physical behaviors at the cellular scale: how cells grow, how they divide, how they change their shapes to move, and how cells respond to their environment. To develop a mechanistic understanding of single-cell behavior we develop theory, design new experiments and computational methods for single-cell analyses. Topics of interest include studying the spatial organization and dynamics of sub-cellular structures, and how these control cellular processes. To this end, the Si lab<\/a> develops and adapts single-cell techniques, such as microfluidics, to obtain high-quality data that can help reveal quantitative relationships between the complicated cell fitness and form. On the theory side, Banerjee lab<\/a> develops computational models to relate molecular-scale dynamics with cellular-scale physical behavior, including cell growth, motility and replication cycle.<\/p>\n

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Membrane Biophysics<\/span><\/h2>\n

Lipid membranes form the boundaries of all living cells, and many internal organelles in nucleated cells. They are molecularly thin fluid elastic films with amazing material properties that underly their biological function, many of which pose unanswered biophysical and biological questions to this day. Why are there so many different types of lipids? How do proteins insert into, bind onto, and fold inside membranes? How do cell membranes maintain their asymmetry? How do elastic properties emerge from their self-assembled components? How are stresses transmitted along membranes? \u2013 Our team has many years of experience in studying lipid membranes using experiment, theory, and computation. Using diffuse X-ray scattering, neutron reflectometry, densitometry, surface plasmon resonance, molecular dynamics simulation, systematic coarse-graining, continuum theory, differential geometry, and statistical field theory we apply a wide set of tools to learn more about the thin films that separate life from death.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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Biological information processing and control<\/h2>\n

A central mystery in biophysics is how cells make decisions. Starting from a soup of molecules obeying the laws of chemistry and physics, how do living systems process noisy, high-dimensional information and translate it into reliable, coordinated behavior? The Floyd lab addresses these questions using theoretical and computational tools drawn from statistical physics, nonequilibrium thermodynamics, and dynamical systems theory. On the fundamental side, we study how the architecture of biochemical networks, including chemical reaction networks and soft active matter systems, determines their capacity to process information, perform computations, and execute control. On the more applied side, we develop new methods for learning control strategies in complex biological systems, asking how useful policies can emerge from signals that are local, imperfect, and biologically accessible. Together, these efforts aim to build a principled physical understanding of how molecular-scale interactions give rise to the remarkable information-processing capabilities of living cells.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

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Biophysical Tools Development<\/span><\/h2>\n

Our projects offer incentives, test cases and applications for the development of a suite of new biophysical tools as a practical approach to biophysical research. These include single-cell microfluidics and microscopy, X-ray and neutron scattering, statistical physics, non-equilibrium dynamics, differential geometry, field theory, machine learning and molecular dynamics simulations.<\/p>\n

Our recent developments include:<\/p>\n