High-resolution protein structure determination by serial femtosecond crystallography.

Boutet, Sébastien; Lomb, Lukas; Williams, Garth J; Barends, Thomas R M; Aquila, Andrew; Doak, R Bruce; Weierstall, Uwe; DePonte, Daniel P et al. · Science · 2012

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Structure determination of proteins and other macromolecules has historically required the growth of high-quality crystals sufficiently large to diffract x-rays efficiently while withstanding radiation damage. We applied serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) using an x-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) to obtain high-resolution structural information from microcrystals (less than 1 micrometer by 1 micrometer by 3 micrometers) of the well-characterized model protein lysozyme. The agreement with synchrotron data demonstrates the immediate relevance of SFX for analyzing the structure of the large group of difficult-to-crystallize molecules.

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