Growing crystals for x-ray free-electron laser structural studies of biomolecules and their complexes
File(s)ijms-24-16336.pdf (1.19 MB)
Published version
Author(s)
Nanev, Christo
Saridakis, Emmanuel
Chayen, Naomi
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Currently, X-ray crystallography, which typically uses synchrotron sources, remains the dominant method for structural determination of proteins and other biomolecules. However, small protein crystals do not provide sufficiently high-resolution diffraction patterns and suffer radiation damage; therefore, conventional X-ray crystallography needs larger protein crystals. The burgeoning method of serial crystallography using X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) avoids these challenges: it affords excellent structural data from weakly diffracting objects, including tiny crystals. An XFEL is implemented by irradiating microjets of suspensions of microcrystals with very intense X-ray beams. However, while the method for creating microcrystalline microjets is well established, little attention is given to the growth of high-quality nano/microcrystals suitable for XFEL experiments. In this study, in order to assist the growth of such crystals, we calculate the mean crystal size and the time needed to grow crystals to the desired size in batch crystallization (the predominant method for preparing the required microcrystalline slurries); this time is reckoned theoretically both for microcrystals and for crystals larger than the upper limit of the Gibbs–Thomson effect. The impact of the omnipresent impurities on the growth of microcrystals is also considered quantitatively. Experiments, performed with the model protein lysozyme, support the theoretical predictions.
Date Issued
2023-11-15
Date Acceptance
2023-10-30
Citation
International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 2023, 24 (22)
ISSN
1422-0067
Publisher
MDPI AG
Journal / Book Title
International Journal of Molecular Sciences
Volume
24
Issue
22
Copyright Statement
© 2023 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
License URL
Publication Status
Published
Article Number
ARTN 16336