Detalle de: Innovation versus practice in biological crystallization

Edward Snell, of the Hauptmann Woodward Institute in Buffalo, NY has a great introduction to his talks on crystallization Without crystals, there is no crystallography – without crystallography, there are no crystallographers. This succinctly points out the direct relationship between crystal growth and our professional livelihood. And yet, despite that, there is little concerted effort at getting better at growing well diffracting crystals. Looking back over the last 50 years of macromolecular crystal growth, there have been arguably only four game changers – the introduction of polyethylene glycols (PEGs) as precipitants (1970s) (McPherson, 1976); the introduction of pre-mixed crystallization screens (1990s) (Jancarik & Kim, 1991); the commercialization of automation (2000s) (Shaw Stewart & Mueller-Dieckman