Ilya Balabin's page at Duke University

Research Interests

• Theory and computer simulations of biomolecular structure and function

• Medical and bioengineering applications of biological molecules

• Development of novel methods and software

Protein Mechanics and Function

• I. A. Balabin, W. Yang, and D. N. Beratan. Coarse-grained modeling of allosteric regulation in protein receptors. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, in press (2009).

• A. Aksimentiev, I. A. Balabin, R. H. Fillingame, and K. Schulten. Insights into the molecular mechanism of rotation in the F_o sector of ATP synthase. Biophys. J. 86 1332-1344 (2004). [PDF]

Biological Electron Transfer

• I. A. Balabin, S. S. Skourtis, and D. N. Beratan. The persistence of structure over fluctuations in biological electron-transfer reactions. Phys. Rev. Lett. 101, 158102 (2008) (cover article). [PDF] [Supporting information]

• J. Lin, I. A. Balabin, and D. N. Beratan. The nature of aqueous tunneling pathways between electron-transfer proteins. Science 310, 1311-1313(2005). [PDF]

• I. A. Balabin, and J. N. Onuchic. Dynamically controlled protein tunneling paths in photosynthetic reaction centers. Science 290, 114-117 (2000). [PDF]

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Molecular Electronics

• J. Lee, I. A. Balabin, D. N. Beratan, J.-G. Lee, and J. T. Yates, Jr. Charge transfer though chemisorbed organic molecules – Neutralization of ionization processes at local sites in the molecule. Chem. Phys. Lett. 412, 171-175 (2005). [PDF]

• I. A. Balabin and J. N. Onuchic. Connection between simple models and quantum chemical models for electron-transfer tunneling matrix element calculations: A Dyson's equations-based approach. J. Phys. Chem. B100, 11573-11580 (1996). [PDF]