Ab initio structure determination from prion nanocrystals at atomic resolution by MicroED.

ABSTRACT: Electrons, because of their strong interaction with matter, produce high-resolution diffraction patterns from tiny 3D crystals only a few hundred nanometers thick in a frozen-hydrated state. This discovery offers the prospect of facile structure determination of complex biological macromolecules, which cannot be coaxed to form crystals large enough for conventional crystallography or cannot easily be produced in sufficient quantities. Two potential obstacles stand in the way. The first is a phenomenon known as dynamical scattering, in which multiple scattering events scramble the recorded electron diffraction intensities so that they are no longer informative of the crystallized molecule. The second obstacle is the lack of a proven means of de novo phase determination, as is required if th

SUBMITTER: Sawaya MR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5056061 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature