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Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase.

ABSTRACT: Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) enables high-resolution protein structure determination using micrometre-sized crystals at room temperature with minimal effects from radiation damage. SFX requires a steady supply of microcrystals intersecting the XFEL beam at random orientations. An LCP-SFX method has recently been introduced in which microcrystals of membrane proteins are grown and delivered for SFX data collection inside a gel-like membrane-mimetic matrix, known as lipidic cubic phase (LCP), using a special LCP microextrusion injector. Here, it is demonstrated that LCP can also be used as a suitable carrier medium for microcrystals of soluble proteins, enabling a dramatic reduction in the amount of crystallized protein required for data collection compared with crystals delivered by liquid injectors. High-quality LCP-SFX data sets were collected for two soluble proteins, lysozyme and phycocyanin, using less than 0.1?mg of each protein.

SUBMITTER: Fromme R

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4547822 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase.

Fromme Raimund R Ishchenko Andrii A Metz Markus M Chowdhury Shatabdi Roy SR Basu Shibom S Boutet Sébastien S Fromme Petra P White Thomas A TA Barty Anton A Spence John C H JC Weierstall Uwe U Liu Wei W Cherezov Vadim V

IUCrJ 20150804 Pt 5

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) at X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) enables high-resolution protein structure determination using micrometre-sized crystals at room temperature with minimal effects from radiation damage. SFX requires a steady supply of microcrystals intersecting the XFEL beam at random orientations. An LCP-SFX method has recently been introduced in which microcrystals of membrane proteins are grown and delivered for SFX data collection inside a gel-like membrane-mimeti ...[more]

PMID: 26306196

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Project description:Membrane proteins (MPs) are essential components of cellular membranes and primary drug targets. Rational drug design relies on precise structural information, typically obtained by crystallography; however MPs are difficult to crystallize. Recent progress in MP structural determination has benefited greatly from the development of lipidic cubic phase (LCP) crystallization methods, which typically yield well-diffracting, but often small crystals that suffer from radiation damage during traditional crystallographic data collection at synchrotron sources. The development of new-generation X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL) sources that produce extremely bright femtosecond pulses has enabled room temperature data collection from microcrystals with no or negligible radiation damage. Our recent efforts in combining LCP technology with serial femtosecond crystallography (LCP-SFX) have resulted in high-resolution structures of several human G protein-coupled receptors, which represent a notoriously difficult target for structure determination. In the LCP-SFX technique, LCP is recruited as a matrix for both growth and delivery of MP microcrystals to the intersection of the injector stream with an XFEL beam for crystallographic data collection. It has been demonstrated that LCP-SFX can substantially improve the diffraction resolution when only sub-10 µm crystals are available, or when the use of smaller crystals at room temperature can overcome various problems associated with larger cryocooled crystals, such as accumulation of defects, high mosaicity and cryocooling artifacts. Future advancements in X-ray sources and detector technologies should make serial crystallography highly attractive and practicable for implementation not only at XFELs, but also at more accessible synchrotron beamlines. Here we present detailed visual protocols for the preparation, characterization and delivery of microcrystals in LCP for serial crystallography experiments. These protocols include methods for conducting crystallization experiments in syringes, detecting and characterizing the crystal samples, optimizing crystal density, loading microcrystal laden LCP into the injector device and delivering the sample to the beam for data collection.

Dataset Information

Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase.

Publications

Serial femtosecond crystallography of soluble proteins in lipidic cubic phase.

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