Dear All,
I took over this project last September. Since the information in the
lab are not well managed, it's kind of starting over (WRONG plasmids
sequences; even WRONG oligo length/sequence in the complex which has been
successfully crystallized. Those crystals only gave low resolution data.) My
boss told me to mutate the Cys to Ser, see if it would help. I finally got
many perfect-looking crystals, and sent them to synchrotron. We didn't get
better data at all. I think it makes sense, because the crystallization
condition is similar to the one they got previously (I have tried their
condition first of course, but at that time, the DNA oligoes were wrong!)
I am trying MBP fusion now, but am very upset these days that I have
made some stupid mistakes. How to cheer up? And most importantly, what
should I do to improve the resolution? I heard a talk on a conference about
microbeam. AND, a student in another crystallography lab in the same
department has tried microbeam and got VERY GOOD data which far far beyond
her and all others' expectation. In our lab, we didn't even know they were
going to try the microbeam in chicago. Also, anyone can share experience
with dehydrating crystals?
Although I didn't get good data this time, I have to say that, I have
learnt a LOT during crystal screening, cryo, and remote control of
synchrontron beamline from people in other labs.
Thanks,
Xun
first year PhD
