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Oct 8, 2022 marked the 100th birth anniversary of a great Indian physicist G. N. Ramachandran, who is in the same league as physicists C.V. Raman, M.N. Saha and S.N. Bose. What did he do to deserve this and what was the work’s impact on science?
One of the important discoveries made by GNR, as he was known, was to unravel the structure of collagen – a substance that is found in bones, tendons etc and is the most abundant protein found in animals.
In 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick deciphered the structure of the DNA molecule which was a double helix. However, the structure of proteins eluded discovery. This was one of the major problems of the time.
Proteins are long strings of amino acids and the way they fold, we know today, is very important and an incorrect folding can lead to many disorders.
By isolating collagen from shark ray, rat tail tendon and kangaroo tail tendon, GNR’s team identified for the first time that the large biomolecule has what GNR called a ‘coiled-coil’ structure and what was dubbed by other scientists a ‘triple helix’ structure. GNR and his collaborator Gopinath Kartha published this result in two papers in Nature journal in 1954 and 1955.
Despite being the first to make this discovery the duo did not get due recognition. Ramachandran also moved on to make other, seminal contributions, in particular, the way to understand protein folding, which goes by the name of Ramachandran Plot.
Every year, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research awards the G. N. Ramachandran gold medal for excellence in biological sciences and technology. Also, the Central Leather Research Institute houses the Triple Helix Auditorium, so named after GNR’s ingenious discovery of collagen structure.
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Published - October 12, 2022 05:09 pm IST