Protein Polycrystallography

R. B. Von Dreele

IPNS/APS, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL 60549 USA

e-mail: vondreele@anl.gov

The application of powder diffraction to polycrystalline proteins has seen a number of significant advances. Faster data collection techniques have reduced the sample size requirement to less than 1mg and allowed acquisition of high quality data in < 30sec permitting in situ exploration of protein crystallization, reactions and radiation damage effects. Recent developments in data analysis include the use of multiple data sets in combined stereochemically restrained Rietveld refinements and Pawley refinements to enhance the information content of the powder data and possibly provide a route to protein structure solution.