1. A Practical Approach to Protein Crystallography
- Author
-
Carmelinda Savino and Andrea Ilari
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,Structure (mathematical logic) ,030103 biophysics ,Theoretical computer science ,Computer science ,Macromolecular crystallography ,Protein Data Bank (RCSB PDB) ,A protein ,Crystal structure ,computer.file_format ,Protein Data Bank ,Coordinates refinement ,Model building ,Molecular replacement ,Protein crystallization ,X-ray crystallography ,law.invention ,03 medical and health sciences ,Crystallography ,030104 developmental biology ,Structural biology ,law ,Crystallization ,computer ,Macromolecule - Abstract
Macromolecular crystallography is a powerful tool for structural biology. The resolution of a protein crystal structure is becoming much easier than in the past, thanks to developments in computing, automation of crystallization techniques and high-flux synchrotron sources to collect diffraction datasets. The aim of this chapter is to provide practical procedures to determine a protein crystal structure, illustrating the new techniques, experimental methods and software that have made protein crystallography a tool accessible to a larger scientific community. It is impossible to give more than a taste of what the X-ray crystallographic technique entails in one brief chapter and there are different ways to solve a protein structure. Since the number of structures available in the Protein Data Bank (PDB) is becoming ever larger (the protein data bank now contains more than 100,000 entries) and therefore the probability to find a good model to solve the structure is ever increasing, we focus our attention on the Molecular Replacement method. Indeed, whenever applicable, this method allows the resolution of macromolecular structures starting from a single data set and a search model downloaded from the PDB, with the aid only of computer work.
- Published
- 2016