Acoustic methods for high-throughput protein crystal mounting at next-generation macromolecular crystallographic beamlines

作者：Roessler Christian G; Kuczewski Anthony; Stearns Richard; Ellson Richard; Olechno Joseph; Orville Allen M; Allaire Marc; Soares Alexei S^*; Heroux Annie

来源：Journal of Synchrotron Radiation, 2013, 20(5): 805-808.

DOI：10.1107/S0909049513020372

• acoustic droplet ejection
• conveyor belt
• crystal mounting
• high throughput
• X-ray diffraction
• macromolecular crystallography

To take full advantage of advanced data collection techniques and high beam flux at next-generation macromolecular crystallography beamlines, rapid and reliable methods will be needed to mount and align many samples per second. One approach is to use an acoustic ejector to eject crystal-containing droplets onto a solid X-ray transparent surface, which can then be positioned and rotated for data collection. Proof-of-concept experiments were conducted at the National Synchrotron Light Source on thermolysin crystals acoustically ejected onto a polyimide 'conveyor belt'. Small wedges of data were collected on each crystal, and a complete dataset was assembled from a well diffracting subset of these crystals. Future developments and implementation will focus on achieving ejection and translation of single droplets at a rate of over one hundred per second.

• 出版日期2013-9