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Guidelines for the presentations:

WEB presentation:

Fully dissect your macromolecule's structure, identifying:

structural motif(s)
Features of the molecule which stabilize the folded structure
Features of the molecules which are important for its cellular function
- Examples include substrate binding, ligand binding, interactions with other macromolecules.
- A terse description of the cellular function is appropriate, but your presentation should focus on the structural features

Prepare a narrative which describes these and other interesting aspects of your macromolecule. Tie your structural observations to (non-crystallographic) results from the literature.

For each of the above, exploit CHIME buttons throughout your narrative to illustrate key structural features

Remember that the key is to demonstrate what you have learned in class. A detailed explanation of the clinical effects of sickle cell hemoglobin won't hurt your grade, but will not help it either.

Oral presentation:

Prepare a 15 min oral presentation, using your CHIME presentation

Hilight what you deem most interesting about your structure

This will be a subset of your entire CHIME presentation. Pick and choose what you find most illustrates concepts you have learned in class.

What is he looking for?

You'll note that much of the above asks you to decide what is interesting, structurally. One of the goals of this course is to help you develop insight to make such decisions. So what you choose is an illustration of how much you have learned. Simple observations like "the protein has 362 amino acids" don't reflect much insight. Observations like "the protein forms a ligand binding pocket (Leu63, Ile62, and Pro120) which is hydrophobic around the ligand methyl group, but which has specific (polar) H-bond donors (Gln25 and backbone carbonyl of Ile62) which interact with the matching groups on the ligand and two water-mediated contacts (Arg130 and Asn33) with the ligand phosphate group" illustrate that you can identify biologically important interactions.

It is my intention that this exercise be a very enjoyable learning experience, as well as a chance to show off what you have learned. Get into your structure and have fun!

Plagiarism

It should go without saying, but be careful about unintentional plagiarism. Your presentation should be your work and your words. Also be careful to give attribution (literature citations) wherever appropriate. The introduction should give a link to the PDB entry(s). Additional hyperlinks to Medline entries for citations are particularly apropos. Eric Martz has written a very nice set of guidelines for making CHIME presentations, including discussion of these issues.