Crystal structure made easy

Crystallizing proteins is a daunting task. Last year Alexander McPherson of the University of California, Irvine, and colleagues proposed a novel strategy to develop crystals quickly by including high concentrations of small molecules to the so-called mother liquors. They analyzed data on the crystallization of 81 different protein cultured in the presence of small molecules that could serve as ligands and potentially promote lattice formation. Recently they examined nine of those crystal structures and looked for evidence that the small molecules indeed aided crystallization.1

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