Stephanie Tristram-Nagle Associate Research Professor Physics Ph.D., University of California Berkeley, 1981   Email: stn@cmu.edu Phone: (412) 268-3174 FAX: (412) 681-0648 Personal Home Page

My research interests are in lipid membrane structure and thermodynamics. Our Biophysics laboratory explores the structure of biological phospholipids, lipid/peptide and lipid/cholesterol mixtures using oriented samples on substrates and unoriented multilamellar or large unilamellar vesicles using X-ray diffraction with a Rigaku rotating anode and CCD detector here at CMU, and with synchrotron radiation at the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source.  We also use differential scanning calorimetry to measure specific heat changes during phase transitions of aqueous dispersions of phospholipids in the form of MLVs. The third technique which yields structural information about the lipid volume as a function of temperature is density centrifugation, using D₂O-H₂O mixtures

Selected Publications

See website http://lipid.phys.cmu.edu for other publications.

Pan, J., Mills, T.T., Tristram-Nagle, S. and Nagle, J.F. 2008. "Cholesterol Perturbs Lipid Bilayers Nonuniversally."  Phys. Rev. Letts. 100:198103 (PDF)

Mills, T.T., Toombes, G.E.S., Tristram-Nagle, S., Smilgies, D-M., Feigenson, G.W. and Nagle, J.F. 2008. “Order parameters and areas in fluid-phase oriented lipid membranes using wide angle x-ray scattering”, Biophys. J. BioFast. (PDF)

Mills, T.T., Tristram-Nagle, S., Heberle, F.A., Morales, N.F., Zhao, J., Wu, J., Toombes, G.E.S., Nagle, J.F.and Feigenson, G.W., 2007, “Liquid-liquid domains in bilayers detected by wide angle x-ray scattering”, Biophys. J. BioFast. (PDF)

Greenwood, A. I., Pan, J., Mills, T. T., Nagle, J. F., Epand, R. M. and Tristram-Nagle, S.  “CRAC motif peptide of the HIV-1 gp41 protein thins SOPC membranes and interacts with cholesterol”.  Biochim. Biophys. Acta 1778:1120-1130. (PDF)

Nagle, J.F., Mathai, J.C., Zeidel, M.L. and Tristram-Nagle, S., 2008, “Theory of passive permeability through lipid bilayers”, J. Gen. Physiol. 131:77-85. (PDF)

Mathai, J.C. , Tristram-Nagle, S., Nagle, J.F. and Zeidel, M.L., 2008. “Structural Determinants of Water Permeability through the Lipid Membrane”, J. Gen. Physiol. 131:69-76. (PDF)

Pan, J., Tristram-Nagle, S. and Nagle, J. F. 2007. “Temperature Dependence of Structure, Bending Rigidity and Bilayer Interations of DOPC Bilayers”. Biophysical Journal J. 94:117-124. (PDF)

Tristram-Nagle, S., 2007, “Preparation of oriented, fully hydrated lipid samples for structure determination using x-ray scattering, for “Methods in Molecular Biology 400 (Methods in Membrane Lipids)”, pp. 63-75, ed. Alex Dopico, Humana Press, Totowa, NJ. (PDF)

Tristram-Nagle, S. and Nagle, J.F. 2007. “HIV-1 Fusion Peptide Decreases Bending Energy, Promotes Curved Fusion Intermediates”.  Biophys. J. 93: 2048-2055. (PDF)