Hi Lily We have had this problem too, and it can be unpleasant! The skin is not too much of a problem if the crystals are robust - but your's sound V fragile. We became reasonably adept at lifting / cutting the skin off and harvesting the (usually sadly decimated) remains. Sometimes setting up screens at 4C can reduce skin formation. Also try different PEGs or slightly lowering the protein conc. A longshot is to try putting oil on top of the reservoir, or switch to sitting drops - this can solve the problem if all the crystals are stuck to the skin and are destroyed when you touch the skin - the downside to this is sometimes they stick to the plastic instead and are equally unhappy when you try to harvest.
Cheers J Jinzhi Tan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:> > Dear All, > > The crystals of my protein always grow from one point to all of the > direction, with very very thin plates intersecting with each other. And > also heavy skin on the surface. It is difficult to remove the skin when > mounting the crystals. The precipitant contains 25% PEGMME 5000. I > tried seeding methods, but I can not get the single crystals any more. > > Thank you for any suggestions. > > Lily Tan -- Professor James Whisstock NHMRC Principal Research Fellow / Monash University Senior Logan fellow Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Monash University, Clayton Campus, PO Box 13d, VIC, 3800, Australia +613 9905 3747 (Phone) +613 9905 4699 (Fax) +61 418 170 585 (Mobile)
