Re: [ccp4bb] How to obtain an oca file?

2008-05-05 Thread Jan Dohnalek

We miss the MSD target service a lot. Is there a real reason why it's gone?
Jan Dohnalek


Eleanor Dodson wrote:
Thwe MSD target service has gone, and that was the way I created oca 
files comparing sequences?

Is there another web site which will give back the same format?
Eleanor




--
==
Mr. Jan Dohnalek, Ph.D
Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry
Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic
Laboratory of Structural Analysis of Molecules
Heyrovskeho nam. 2
16206 Prague 6
Tel: +420 296809205
Fax: +420 296809410
==


[ccp4bb] Announcement... New CCP4 documentation wiki

2008-05-05 Thread Kevin Cowtan
We've set up a new way of documenting the CCP4 software, which the aim 
of being more accessible to GUI and novice users. The new documentation 
is in the form of a wiki, which you can visit here:

 http://ccp4wiki.org/

Unlike Kay Deidrich's community wiki, the aim of this site is not to be 
editable by most users (the wiki engine is just used for convenience), 
but rather to be an easier-to-maintain and update way of documenting the 
software. The focus will be on how to user the software through the user 
interface. As a result, the contributors will mainly by program authors, 
and a few expert users.


It's not complete, but based on feedback at a recent course, it is 
already good enough to be useful.


The site is divided into two main areas:

1. How to use the software. This has been organised to mirror the steps 
you might take in solving your structure, and the modules of the user 
interface.


2. Knowledge base. This contains a fairly extensive glossary of terms 
used in the software documentation, along with some other information. 
There is also a collection of lectures from recent workshops.


Please have a look and see if it useful to you. Feedback is very 
welcome. If you like the format but think specific articles need work 
(or indeed are missing), please tell me and I'll pass on the requests.


Kevin


[ccp4bb] Negative density around C of COO-

2008-05-05 Thread Narayanan Ramasubbu

Dear all:
I am noticing that in some of my structures, at 1.5 A resolution, 1) 
there is some negative density around the C of the carboxyl groups.
2) I also notice the negative density around S in a disulfide region. It 
is as though the disulfide is broken.


Could some body enlighten me on this feature?


Re: [ccp4bb] Negative density around C of COO-

2008-05-05 Thread Kevin P Madauss
I would suspect radiation damage for the S density .  I have not seen 
radiation damage of only COO carbons, but then again, I do not routinely 
get such good diffraction. 





Kevin P Madauss  V-161a
US Structural Biology   GlaxoSmithKline 
Office:  919.483.3759  5 Moore Drive 
Cell:  919.924.6436  RTP, NC 27709
 


Re: [ccp4bb] Negative density around C of COO-

2008-05-05 Thread Roger Rowlett

Narayanan Ramasubbu wrote:

Dear all:
I am noticing that in some of my structures, at 1.5 A resolution, 1)
there is some negative density around the C of the carboxyl groups.
2) I also notice the negative density around S in a disulfide region. It
is as though the disulfide is broken.

Could some body enlighten me on this feature?
  
Synchrotron radiation can cause free radical mediated damage to 
proteins. The most frequently observed consequences are decarboxlation 
of Asp and Glu, and the breakage of disulfide bonds. See, for example, 
Wiek et al. (2000) PNAS 97, 623-628, and Leiros et al. (2001) Acta 
Cryst. D 57, 488-497.


Cheers,


--

Roger S. Rowlett
Professor
Colgate University Presidential Scholar
Department of Chemistry
Colgate University
13 Oak Drive
Hamilton, NY 13346

tel: (315)-228-7245
ofc: (315)-228-7395
fax: (315)-228-7935
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]


[ccp4bb] Summary: Negative density around COOH

2008-05-05 Thread Narayanan Ramasubbu

Thanks for the quick reply and pointing out t bunch of references.

Radiation damage has been pointed out as a cause for such feature.
The following references were pointed out.

Ravelli, R.B.G.  McSweeney, S.M. (2000). The 'fingerprint' that X-rays can leave on structures. Structure 8:315-328. 
Wiek et al. (2000) PNAS 97, 623-628, and 
Leiros et al. (2001) Acta Cryst. D 57, 488-497.


Subbu


[ccp4bb] question on how crystals form

2008-05-05 Thread Michael Colaneri
Dear colleagues,

I have a structure with two identical dimers per asymmetric unit.  If the
dimers are identical in different crystalline environments and in different
crystal forms they should be particularly stable.

How does such a stable dimer crystallize?  Is it necessay to pre-exist in
the specific conformation in solution (even to a lesser extent than a major
monomeric form) or a very stable dimer can assemble from the very beginning
durnig crystallization?  And can the same dimer form during crystallization
in different crystalline environments without it being present in solution
to any (even infinitesimal) extent?

I would appreciate all responses.

Thanks.

Mike Colaneri


[ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Chris Waddling
Basically, the newest version of HKL2000 won't run on Linux machines that do
not have the libg2c.so.0 library (part of gcc3) in /usr/lib/ .   This is a
problem for us, as every new computer we acquire uses a version of Linux
(that is no longer terribly new) that uses gcc4 (which does not have the
libg2c.so.0 library) and not gcc3.

We've tried pointing our LD_LIBRARY_PATH to a directory that has this old
library in it, but HKL2000 won't recognize it.  I have tried an experiment
of putting the library into the /usr/lib/ folder, and HKl2000 runs, but our
sys-admin refuses to let it stay there.

Has anyone made this work (i.e. Am I missing something that is probably
quite simple)?

Thanks,

Chris

--
Dr. Christopher A. Waddling, Ph.D.
University of California at San Francisco
MC 2140
S126C
600 16th St., 
San Francisco, CA
94158-2517
(415) 476-8288 (office)
(415) 502-7779 (lab)
(415) 514-4142 (fax)
(415) 810-7556 (cell)
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
AIM duckie2k1
Skype chriswaddling


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread James Stroud
Get a new sys-admin. He is getting in the way of your research. There  
is no good reason to be paranoid about this particular shared library  
sitting in /usr/lib.


James

On May 5, 2008, at 1:32 PM, Chris Waddling wrote:

I have tried an experiment
of putting the library into the /usr/lib/ folder, and HKl2000 runs,  
but our

sys-admin refuses to let it stay there.


--
James Stroud
UCLA-DOE Institute for Genomics and Proteomics
Box 951570
Los Angeles, CA 90095

http://www.jamesstroud.com


Re: [ccp4bb] question on how crystals form

2008-05-05 Thread Juergen Bosch

Hi Mike,

how does your protein look on a sizing column ? Perhaps a dimer ? That 
would then explain the tendency to form dimers in different crystal 
forms, as it is a biological relevant dimer. for the eventuality that 
you have no clue how the sizing looks like, run one and find out.


Juergen

Michael Colaneri wrote:


Dear colleagues,
 
I have a structure with two identical dimers per asymmetric unit.  If 
the dimers are identical in different crystalline environments and in 
different crystal forms they should be particularly stable.
 
How does such a stable dimer crystallize?  Is it necessay to pre-exist 
in the specific conformation in solution (even to a lesser extent than 
a major monomeric form) or a very stable dimer can assemble from the 
very beginning durnig crystallization?  And can the same dimer form 
during crystallization in different crystalline environments without 
it being present in solution to any (even infinitesimal) extent?
 
I would appreciate all responses.
 
Thanks.
 
Mike Colaneri




--
Jürgen Bosch
University of Washington
Dept. of Biochemistry, K-426
1705 NE Pacific Street
Seattle, WA 98195
Box 357742
Phone:   +1-206-616-4510
FAX: +1-206-685-7002
Web: http://faculty.washington.edu/jbosch


Re: [ccp4bb] Negative density around C of COO-

2008-05-05 Thread James Holton
I don't mean to single anyone out, but the assignment of free radicals 
as the species mediating radiation damage at cryo temperatures is a pet 
peeve of mine.  Free radicals have been shown to mediate damage at room 
temperature (and there is a VERY large body of literature on this), but 
there are a great many good reasons to think that free radicals do NOT 
play a role in radiation damage under cryo.


This assignment of free radicals to damage is often made (flippantly) 
in the literature, but I feel a strong need to point out that there is 
NO EVIDENCE of a free radical diffusion mechanism for radiation damage 
below ~130K.  To the contrary there is a great deal of evidence that 
water, buffers and protein crystals below ~130 K are in a state of 
matter known as a solid, and molecules (such as free radicals) do not 
diffuse through solids (except on geological timescales).  If you are 
worried that the x-ray beam is heating your crystal to 130 K, then have 
a look at Snell et. al. JSR 14 109-15 (2007).  They showed quite 
convincingly that this just can't happen for anything but the most 
exotic situations.


There is evidence, however, of energy transfer taking place between 
different regions of the crystal, but energy transfer does not require 
molecular diffusion or any other kind of mass transport.  In fact, 
solid-state chemistry is generally mediated by cascading 
neighbor-to-neighbor reactions that do not involve diffusion in the 
traditional sense.  Electricity is an example of this kind of chemistry, 
and these reactions are a LOT faster than diffusion.  The closest 
analogy to diffusion is that the propagating reaction can be seen as a 
species of sorts that is moving around inside the sample.  Entities 
like this are formally called quasiparticles.  Some quasiparticles are 
charged, but others are not.  If you don't know what a quasiparticle is, 
you can look them up in wikipedia. 

Some have tried to rescue the free radical statements about radiation 
damage by claiming that individual electrons are radicals.  I guess 
this must come from the pressure of such a large body of free-radical 
literature at room temperature.  However, IMHO this is about as useful 
as declaring that every chemical reaction is a free radical reaction 
(since they involve the movement of electrons).   I think it best that 
we try to call the chemistry what it is and try to stamp out rumors that 
mechanisms are known when in reality they are not.


Just my little rant.

-James Holton
MAD Scientist


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Roger Rowlett

Chris Waddling wrote:

Basically, the newest version of HKL2000 won't run on Linux machines that do
not have the libg2c.so.0 library (part of gcc3) in /usr/lib/ .   This is a
problem for us, as every new computer we acquire uses a version of Linux
(that is no longer terribly new) that uses gcc4 (which does not have the
libg2c.so.0 library) and not gcc3.

We've tried pointing our LD_LIBRARY_PATH to a directory that has this old
library in it, but HKL2000 won't recognize it.  I have tried an experiment
of putting the library into the /usr/lib/ folder, and HKl2000 runs, but our
sys-admin refuses to let it stay there.

Has anyone made this work (i.e. Am I missing something that is probably
quite simple)?

Thanks,

Chris

--
Dr. Christopher A. Waddling, Ph.D.
University of California at San Francisco
MC 2140
S126C
600 16th St.,
San Francisco, CA
94158-2517
(415) 476-8288 (office)
(415) 502-7779 (lab)
(415) 514-4142 (fax)
(415) 810-7556 (cell)
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
AIM duckie2k1
Skype chriswaddling
  
Have you installed the compatibility libraries compat-libstdc++-33 and 
libstdc++296? This is easily accomplished using yum if it is installed, 
e.g.,


$ yum -y install compat-libstdc++-33 compat-libstdc++-296

These libraries are required for programs compiled using GCC 3.x

Cheers,


--

Roger S. Rowlett
Professor
Colgate University Presidential Scholar
Department of Chemistry
Colgate University
13 Oak Drive
Hamilton, NY 13346

tel: (315)-228-7245
ofc: (315)-228-7395
fax: (315)-228-7935
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Robert Campbell
On Mon, 05 May 2008 13:48:00 -0600, James Stroud [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Get a new sys-admin. He is getting in the way of your research. There  
 is no good reason to be paranoid about this particular shared library  
 sitting in /usr/lib.
 
 James
 
 On May 5, 2008, at 1:32 PM, Chris Waddling wrote:
  I have tried an experiment
  of putting the library into the /usr/lib/ folder, and HKl2000 runs,  
  but our
  sys-admin refuses to let it stay there.

I'd echo James, but to say that there is no reason that you cannot have both
gcc3 and gcc4 installed.

Cheers,
Rob
-- 
Robert L. Campbell, Ph.D.
Senior Research Associate/Adjunct Assistant Professor 
Botterell Hall Rm 644
Department of Biochemistry, Queen's University, 
Kingston, ON K7L 3N6  Canada
Tel: 613-533-6821Fax: 613-533-2497
[EMAIL PROTECTED]http://pldserver1.biochem.queensu.ca/~rlc


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Robert Campbell
Hi Chris,

On Mon, 05 May 2008 12:57:17 -0700, Chris Waddling
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Robert,
 
 that's exactly what I keep asking him to do maybe I 
 should take James Stroud's advice...

Yes, maybe you should, if you cannot convince him of the error of his ways. :)

 BTW, nice to hear from my M.Sc. alma mater... I worked in 
 Donal Macarntney's Chemistry lab from '91-93.

I haven't crossed paths with Donal, just with a couple of others like Victor
Snieckus and David Zechel in the Chemistry department here.

Cheers,
Rob
-- 
Robert L. Campbell, Ph.D.
Senior Research Associate/Adjunct Assistant Professor 
Botterell Hall Rm 644
Department of Biochemistry, Queen's University, 
Kingston, ON K7L 3N6  Canada
Tel: 613-533-6821Fax: 613-533-2497
[EMAIL PROTECTED]http://pldserver1.biochem.queensu.ca/~rlc


[ccp4bb] negative LLG in Phaser run

2008-05-05 Thread Oganesyan, Vaheh
Phaser experts,

When running Phaser I see LL gain becoming negative closer to the end.
What would that mean?
Resolution ~3.0 A, s.g. I222, 2 complexes per a.u.
Here is the line from log file:
ANNOTATION:  RFZ=7.6 TFZ=8.9 PAK=0 LLG=142 RFZ=6.6 TFZ=18.0 PAK=0
LLG=150 RFZ=4.6
   TFZ=12.8 PAK=0 LLG=-44 RFZ=3.8 TFZ=5.8 PAK=19 LLG=-908

Thank you in advance.

__
Oganesyan Vaheh, Ph.D 
Antibody Discovery 
MedImmune, Inc.





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Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Sabuj Pattanayek

Hi,

Have you installed the compatibility libraries compat-libstdc++-33 and 
libstdc++296? This is easily accomplished using yum if it is installed, 
e.g.,


$ yum -y install compat-libstdc++-33 compat-libstdc++-296

These libraries are required for programs compiled using GCC 3.x


Those packages don't provide libg2c but they are good to have. You need 
yum install compat-libf2c-34 for libg2c.so.0 assuming you're using 
RHEL5 or greater. In any case, we're using v0.98.698d and it doesn't 
seem to need libg2c:


% ldd `which hkl2000`

linux-gate.so.1 =  (0x4000)
libX11.so.6 = /usr/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00ada000)
libm.so.6 = /lib/libm.so.6 (0x00a7)
libdl.so.2 = /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00a99000)
libc.so.6 = /lib/libc.so.6 (0x0092e000)
libXau.so.6 = /usr/lib/libXau.so.6 (0x00acd000)
libXdmcp.so.6 = /usr/lib/libXdmcp.so.6 (0x00ad2000)
/lib/ld-linux.so.2 (0x0090d000)

which version of HKL2000 are you using that requires libg2c?


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Michael Strickler

Basically, the newest version of HKL2000 won't run on Linux machines
that do not have the libg2c.so.0 library (part of gcc3) in /usr/lib/
.


This no doubt qualifies as an obvious question, but have you tried 
/usr/local/lib?  That is often automatically searched for libraries on 
Linux systems, and is often used as a resting place for obsolete 
libraries for that reason.


It's preferable, if they're available for your flavor of Linux, to use 
compatibility packages as Professor Rowlett mentions.  You'll probably 
need compat-g77, or something similar, as libg2c is the old Fortran 
compatibility library for GCC.


--
Michael Strickler, Ph.D.
Research Specialist
Center for Structural Biology
Yale University
260 Whitney Ave, 355C JWG
PO Box 208114
New Haven, CT 06520-8114


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread William Scott
On ubuntu, you can get this in the libg2c package.  I agree with James  
Stroud.  Fire the sysadmin and divvy the salary up amongst those who  
really need it. Time to raise the black flag and start slitting throats.



On May 5, 2008, at 12:32 PM, Chris Waddling wrote:

Basically, the newest version of HKL2000 won't run on Linux machines  
that do
not have the libg2c.so.0 library (part of gcc3) in /usr/lib/ .
This is a
problem for us, as every new computer we acquire uses a version of  
Linux
(that is no longer terribly new) that uses gcc4 (which does not have  
the

libg2c.so.0 library) and not gcc3.

We've tried pointing our LD_LIBRARY_PATH to a directory that has  
this old
library in it, but HKL2000 won't recognize it.  I have tried an  
experiment
of putting the library into the /usr/lib/ folder, and HKl2000 runs,  
but our

sys-admin refuses to let it stay there.

Has anyone made this work (i.e. Am I missing something that is  
probably

quite simple)?

Thanks,

Chris

--
Dr. Christopher A. Waddling, Ph.D.
University of California at San Francisco
MC 2140
S126C
600 16th St.,
San Francisco, CA
94158-2517
(415) 476-8288 (office)
(415) 502-7779 (lab)
(415) 514-4142 (fax)
(415) 810-7556 (cell)
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
AIM duckie2k1
Skype chriswaddling


Re: [ccp4bb] Negative density around C of COO-

2008-05-05 Thread Lijun Liu
I believe some, may not be all, negative density may be due to the  
choice of wavelength.  C,O and N are not so sensitive to normally  
used wavelength (1-1.54A), but S does.  This is more true when you  
have higher resolution and better quality data.  You can estimate  
this by f'.


By the way, although I am not a real supporter of radicals from  
damage, I believe that a photo-induced (here X-ray) chemical  
reaction is much different from a heat-induced one.  Low temperature  
is not a problem.  But this not for diffusion, as it is ~100% heat- 
related.  Please point out if I am wrong.
This assignment of free radicals to damage is often made  
(flippantly) in the literature, but I feel a strong need to point  
out that there is NO EVIDENCE of a free radical diffusion mechanism  
for radiation damage below ~130K.


Lijun Liu, PhD
Institute of Molecular Biology
HHMI  Department of Physics
University of Oregon
Eugene, OR 97403
541-346-4080




[ccp4bb] Refmac Error

2008-05-05 Thread Kianoush
Dear All,

I occasionally get the following error after running  refmac:

 #CCP4I TERMINATION STATUS 0 Error from script 
/home/local/LINUX/ccp4-6.0.2/ccp4i/scripts/refmac5.script: error writing 
stdout: I/O error

The above error is from the last lines of the log file. It seems that 
refinement runs fine (I see refinement cycle statistics etc.), however, no pdb 
or mtz file is written out. 

I use CCP4 version 6.0.2.

Thanks for your suggestions,
Kianoush


*
Kianoush Sadre-Bazzaz
Graduate Student, Chris Hill Lab
University of Utah Biochemistry Department
15 N Medical Drive East RM 4100
Salt Lake City UT 84112-5650 USA
(801)585-7068
[EMAIL PROTECTED]


   
-
Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile.  Try it now.

Re: [ccp4bb] Refmac Error

2008-05-05 Thread Roger Rowlett

Kianoush wrote:

Dear All,

I occasionally get the following error after running  refmac:

 #CCP4I TERMINATION STATUS 0 Error from script 
/home/local/LINUX/ccp4-6.0.2/ccp4i/scripts/refmac5.script: error 
writing stdout: I/O error


The above error is from the last lines of the log file. It seems that 
refinement runs fine (I see refinement cycle statistics etc.), 
however, no pdb or mtz file is written out.


I use CCP4 version 6.0.2.

Thanks for your suggestions,
Kianoush


*
Kianoush Sadre-Bazzaz
Graduate Student, Chris Hill Lab
University of Utah Biochemistry Department
15 N Medical Drive East RM 4100
Salt Lake City UT 84112-5650 USA
(801)585-7068
[EMAIL PROTECTED]


Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try 
it now. 
http://us.rd.yahoo.com/evt=51733/*http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ%20 


The very first thing to check is whether or not you have permission to 
write in the directory where the PDB and MTZ files are to be written to. 
This might explain an intermittent error of the type you describe.


Cheers,


--

Roger S. Rowlett
Professor
Colgate University Presidential Scholar
Department of Chemistry
Colgate University
13 Oak Drive
Hamilton, NY 13346

tel: (315)-228-7245
ofc: (315)-228-7395
fax: (315)-228-7935
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Partha Chakrabarti
I had similar problem with Mosflm due to odd combination of Suse and
AMD-64. Copied those files from a different installation, everything
runs just fine.. would agree with James.. lol..



On Mon, May 5, 2008 at 8:32 PM, Chris Waddling [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Basically, the newest version of HKL2000 won't run on Linux machines that do
  not have the libg2c.so.0 library (part of gcc3) in /usr/lib/ .   This is a
  problem for us, as every new computer we acquire uses a version of Linux
  (that is no longer terribly new) that uses gcc4 (which does not have the
  libg2c.so.0 library) and not gcc3.

  We've tried pointing our LD_LIBRARY_PATH to a directory that has this old
  library in it, but HKL2000 won't recognize it.  I have tried an experiment
  of putting the library into the /usr/lib/ folder, and HKl2000 runs, but our
  sys-admin refuses to let it stay there.

  Has anyone made this work (i.e. Am I missing something that is probably
  quite simple)?

  Thanks,

  Chris

  --
  Dr. Christopher A. Waddling, Ph.D.
  University of California at San Francisco
  MC 2140
  S126C
  600 16th St.,
  San Francisco, CA
  94158-2517
  (415) 476-8288 (office)
  (415) 502-7779 (lab)
  (415) 514-4142 (fax)
  (415) 810-7556 (cell)
  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
  AIM duckie2k1
  Skype chriswaddling




-- 
MRC National Institute for Medical Research
Division of Molecular Structure
The Ridgeway, NW7 1AA, UK
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Phone: + 44 208 816 2515


Re: [ccp4bb] Negative density around C of COO-

2008-05-05 Thread Bart Hazes

Hi James,

We used to talk about primary and secondary radiation damage. The former 
operates at room temperature where free radicals were said to be formed 
in solution and diffuse around to damage proteins. Under cryoconditions 
this no longer happens, leading to greatly improved crystal life time, 
but we still have primary radiation damage, with the photons directly 
hitting the protein.


It was my understanding that this was still considered to form a free 
radical at the affected atom without there being any diffusion involved. 
Sulfur atoms would be more sensitive as they have a larger X-ray 
cross-section or because they may act as free-radical sinks where free 
radicals generated nearby strip an electron from the sulfur, thereby 
satisfying their own electronic configuration and converting the sulfur 
into a radical state. For instance, in ribonucleotide reductase a 
tyrosine free radical is formed spontaneously (using oxygen and an 
dinuclear iron site) and jumps over 20 Angstrom from one subunit to 
another to form a thiyl free radical in the active site. It then jumps 
back to the tyrosine upon completion of the catalytic cycle. Although we 
don't know how it jumps, certainly not by diffusion, there is general 
agreement that it does happen.


People have also observed broken disulfides in cryocrystal structures 
with the sulfurs at a distance that is too long for a disulfide but too 
short for a normal non-bonded sulfur-sulfur interaction. I seem to 
remember that this distance was suggested to indicate the presence of a 
thiyl free radical. I'm no chemist of physicist so can't evaluate if 
that claim is reasonable but if it is then that would be direct evidence 
to support the involvement of a free radical state in radiation damage.


So I guess my questions/comments are
- what are the great many good reasons to think that free radicals do 
NOT play a role in radiation damage under cryo.
- although diffusion does not happen below 130K, radicals do appear to 
teleport, at least over short distances.


Bart

James Holton wrote:
I don't mean to single anyone out, but the assignment of free radicals 
as the species mediating radiation damage at cryo temperatures is a pet 
peeve of mine.  Free radicals have been shown to mediate damage at room 
temperature (and there is a VERY large body of literature on this), but 
there are a great many good reasons to think that free radicals do NOT 
play a role in radiation damage under cryo.


This assignment of free radicals to damage is often made (flippantly) 
in the literature, but I feel a strong need to point out that there is 
NO EVIDENCE of a free radical diffusion mechanism for radiation damage 
below ~130K.  To the contrary there is a great deal of evidence that 
water, buffers and protein crystals below ~130 K are in a state of 
matter known as a solid, and molecules (such as free radicals) do not 
diffuse through solids (except on geological timescales).  If you are 
worried that the x-ray beam is heating your crystal to 130 K, then have 
a look at Snell et. al. JSR 14 109-15 (2007).  They showed quite 
convincingly that this just can't happen for anything but the most 
exotic situations.


There is evidence, however, of energy transfer taking place between 
different regions of the crystal, but energy transfer does not require 
molecular diffusion or any other kind of mass transport.  In fact, 
solid-state chemistry is generally mediated by cascading 
neighbor-to-neighbor reactions that do not involve diffusion in the 
traditional sense.  Electricity is an example of this kind of chemistry, 
and these reactions are a LOT faster than diffusion.  The closest 
analogy to diffusion is that the propagating reaction can be seen as a 
species of sorts that is moving around inside the sample.  Entities 
like this are formally called quasiparticles.  Some quasiparticles are 
charged, but others are not.  If you don't know what a quasiparticle is, 
you can look them up in wikipedia.
Some have tried to rescue the free radical statements about radiation 
damage by claiming that individual electrons are radicals.  I guess 
this must come from the pressure of such a large body of free-radical 
literature at room temperature.  However, IMHO this is about as useful 
as declaring that every chemical reaction is a free radical reaction 
(since they involve the movement of electrons).   I think it best that 
we try to call the chemistry what it is and try to stamp out rumors that 
mechanisms are known when in reality they are not.


Just my little rant.

-James Holton
MAD Scientist





--

==

Bart Hazes (Assistant Professor)
Dept. of Medical Microbiology  Immunology
University of Alberta
1-15 Medical Sciences Building
Edmonton, Alberta
Canada, T6G 2H7
phone:  1-780-492-0042
fax:1-780-492-7521

==


Re: [ccp4bb] HKL2000 and gcc4

2008-05-05 Thread Chris Waddling

Thanks all for your suggestions.

It turns out that I was mis-defining the LD_LIBRARY_PATH 
(using 'set' instead of 'setenv').  Dumb mistake, but 
thanks to our sysadmin pointing this out, all's good.


Chris