Outline Of Crystallography For Biologists

X-ray crystallography is the main method used to determine the structure of biological molecules. X-ray crystallography is explained without maths and reading this text allows biologists to assess the quality and accuracy of biological structures.

Outline of Crystallography for Biologists is intended for researchers and students in the biological sciences who require an insight into the methods of X-ray crystallography without needing to learn all the relevant theory. The main text is purely descriptive and is readable by those with minimal mathematical knowledge. Some mathematical detail is given throughout in boxes, but these can be ignored. Theory is limited to the essentials required to comprehend issues of quality. There is an extensive reference section and suggestions for further reading for those who wish to delve deeper. The first part 'Fundamentals' presents the underlying ideas which allow x-ray structure analysis to be carried out and provides an appropriate background to courses in structural determination. The second part 'Practice' gives more information about the procedures employed in the course of crystal structure determination. The emphasis is on the quality measures of X-ray diffraction analysis to give the reader a critical insight into the quality and accuracy of a structure determination and to enable the reader to appreciate which parts of a structure determination may have caused special difficulty. There is no pretence of completeness and many matters discussed in standard crystallography texts are deliberately omitted. However, issues not brought out in the standard texts are discussed, making it a useful resource for non-practising crystallographers as well.

This book provides a complete snapshot of various experimental approaches to structure-based and ligand-based drug design and is illustrated with more than 200 images.

National Science Foundation (NSF) is a unique federal agency because it supports scientific research financially, but does not engage in scientific work itself. Its history is known only in part because the NSF is a vibrant, expanding, and living entity that makes the final telling of its story impossible. Much can be learned from its beginning as well as its component parts. If the founding of the NSF in 1950 was couched in an era of physics, especially atomic physics, certainly by the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st, biology was, and remains, the queen of sciences for the predictable future. This book highlights the elite status of America’s biological sciences as they were funded, affected, and, to a very real degree, interactively guided by the NSF. It examines important events in the earlier history of the Foundation because they play strongly upon the development of the various biology directorates. Issues such as education, applied research, medical science, the National Institutes of Health, the beginnings of biotechnology, and other matters are also discussed.

Structural Biology Using Electrons and X-Rays discusses the diffraction and image-based methods used for the determination of complex biological macromolecules. The book focuses on the Fourier transform theory, which is a mathematical function that is computed to transform signals between time and frequency domain. Composed of five parts, the book examines the development of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), which allows the calculation of the images of a certain protein. Parts 1 to 4 provide the basic information and the applications of Fourier transforms, as well as the different methods used for image processing using X-ray crystallography and the analysis of electron micrographs. Part 5 focuses entirely on the mathematical aspect of Fourier transforms. In addition, the book examines detailed structural analyses of a specimen’s symmetry (i.e., crystals, helices, polyhedral viruses and asymmetrical particles). This book is intended for the biologist or biochemist who is interested in different methods and techniques for calculating the images of proteins using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). It is also suitable for readers without a background in physical chemistry or mathematics. Emphasis on common principles underlying all diffraction-based methods Thorough grounding in theory requires understanding of only simple algebra Visual representations and explanations of challenging content Mathematical detail offered in short-course form to parallel the text

Anhand verschiedener Beispiele zeigen die Autoren die Bedeutung der Kristallographie für Chemie und Biochemie auf und bieten somit eine gute Zusammenfassung der allgemeinen Prinzipien der Kristallstrukturanalyse. Zum einen sollen Interessierte, die diese Methode nicht selbst durchführen, in die Lage versetzt werden, deren Ergebnisse zu interpretieren. Zum anderen wird dem Leser deutlich gemacht, welche Bedeutung die ungeheure Datenmenge, die sich aus dieser Methode ergibt, einerseits für die Chemie sowie andererseits für die Biochemie hat. Das Buch ist verständlich geschrieben und mit zahlreichen Abbildungen versehen. Durch die Darstellung der Kristallstrukturanalyse im Vergleich zu anderen Methoden ist das Werk auch besonders für fortgeschrittene Studenten geeignet, die sich mit der Kristallographie vertraut machen wollen.

With the most comprehensive and up-to-date overview of structure-based drug discovery covering both experimental and computational approaches, Structural Biology in Drug Discovery: Methods, Techniques, and Practices describes principles, methods, applications, and emerging paradigms of structural biology as a tool for more efficient drug development. Coverage includes successful examples, academic and industry insights, novel concepts, and advances in a rapidly evolving field. The combined chapters, by authors writing from the frontlines of structural biology and drug discovery, give readers a valuable reference and resource that: Presents the benefits, limitations, and potentiality of major techniques in the field such as X-ray crystallography, NMR, neutron crystallography, cryo-EM, mass spectrometry and other biophysical techniques, and computational structural biology Includes detailed chapters on druggability, allostery, complementary use of thermodynamic and kinetic information, and powerful approaches such as structural chemogenomics and fragment-based drug design Emphasizes the need for the in-depth biophysical characterization of protein targets as well as of therapeutic proteins, and for a thorough quality assessment of experimental structures Illustrates advances in the field of established therapeutic targets like kinases, serine proteinases, GPCRs, and epigenetic proteins, and of more challenging ones like protein-protein interactions and intrinsically disordered proteins

Synthesizing over thirty years of advances into a comprehensive textbook, Biomolecular Crystallography describes the fundamentals, practices, and applications of protein crystallography. Illustrated in full-color by the author, the text describes mathematical and physical concepts in accessible and accurate language. Biomolecular Crystallography will be a valuable resource for advanced undergraduate and graduate students and practitioners in structural biology, crystallography, and structural bioinformatics.