Macromolecular crystallography, October 14--27, 1997

Abstract

Crystallography and X-ray diffractionStandards & Technologies, Rockville, MD yield a wealth of structural information unobtainable through other 'methods. This intensive laboratory/computational course focused on the major techniques used to determine the three-dimensional structures of macromolecules. It was designed for scientists with a working knowledge of protein structure and function, but who were new to macromolecular crystallography.Topics that were covered included crystallization (proteins, nucleic acids and complexes), crystal characterization, X-ray sources and optics, crystal freezing, data collection, data reduction, anomalous dispersion, multiple isomorphous replacement phase determination, solvent flattening, molecular replacement and averaging, electron density interpretation, structure refinement, molecular graphics, molecuhu-dynamics and multi-dimensional NMR.Participants learned through extensive hands-on experiments where they crystallized and determined a protein structure, along with lectures and informal discussions on the theory behind the techniques. PARTICIPANTS(16):