Detecting intramolecular dynamics and multiple Förster resonance energy transfer states by fluorescence correlation spectroscopy.

Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) is a robust method for the detection of intramolecular dynamics in proteins but is also susceptible to interference from other dynamic processes such as triplet kinetics and photobleaching. We describe an approach for the detection of intramolecular dynamics in proteins labeled with a FRET dye pair based on global fitting to the two autocorrelation functions (green−green and red−red) and the two cross-correlation functions (green−red and red−green). We applied the method to detect intramolecular dynamics in the Ca2+ signaling protein calmodulin. Dynamics were detected on the 100 μs time scale in Ca2+-activated calmodulin, whereas in apocalmodulin dynamics were not detected on this time scale. Control measurements on a polyproline FRET construct (Gly-Pro15-Cys) demonstrate the reliability of the method for isolating intramolecular dynamics from other dynamic processes on the microsecond time scale and confirm the absence of intramolecular dynamics of polyproline....