Tryptophan detection

The intrinsic fluorescence of proteins is due to the aromatic amino acids tryptophan, tyrosine, and phenylalanine. Tryptophan dominates the emission of proteins and is the most sensitive to solvent polarity and the local environment. Analysis of changes in tryptophan fluorescence can yield information on protein denaturation and conformation.

In these application notes, we demonstrate performance of the SpectraMax® multi-mode microplate readers for assays measuring intrinsic tryptophan fluorescence.