Providing a centralized archive of raw data for crystallographic
images would be a great asset to everyone, but most especially to the
original investigator.
I'm reminded of a conversation held with one of my postdoctoral
mentors back in the mid 1990's. She was gazing at the rows of reel-to-
reel tapes on the top shelf in our office, and lamenting that the
data on most of these tapes was now unrecoverable due to the limited
life span of magnetic tapes. This prompted her to encourage her
students to deposit structure factors along with coordinates to the
PDB (at a time when this was not yet required by any journal or
granting agency), "so that our group will always have access to them,
in case our backup schemes fail." I think she would have asked us to
deposit our original images for the same reason, if it had been
possible.
Most archivists will tell you that the best way to back up data is to
make several copies and to store those copies in several different
locations. This holds true for scientific data, printed material,
photos, bank records, etc.
Diana
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Diana R. Tomchick
Associate Professor
University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
Department of Biochemistry
5323 Harry Hines Blvd.
Rm. ND10.214B
Dallas, TX 75390-8816, U.S.A.
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
214-645-6383 (phone)
214-645-6353 (fax)
