| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立中山大學 === 光電工程研究所 === 93 === Collagen is an important structural protein in living organisms and plays an indispensable role in connecting cells and tissues, such as in musculature, bone, and ligament. The stability and conformation of collagen are, however, strongly influenced by ambient temperature and constitutes an interesting subject of study. Thermally induced conformation change of collagen has been investigated by techniques such as differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and second harmonic generation. DSC is a powerful method in uncovered important thermal dynamics properties including phase change, enthalpy, and thermal stability of the collagen. However, due to its collective nature, no localized information can be found. For comparison, second harmonic generation, which reflects structural symmetry, can be combined with laser scanning microscopy to investigate localized variation. It has been shown in previous studies that the thermal stability of collagen is strongly influenced by the water content within collagen. For comparison, we are investigating the conformational change of collagen under a vacuum stat with second harmonic microscopy so as to isolate environmental effects, particularly those from water and oxygen. In this way, we have found the conformational change of collagen takes place at a much higher temperature and activation energy. Additionally, the high spatial resolution achieved also allows many further possibilities.
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