Hi ,
Maybe the lower frequency of the earthquake vibrations or the handling helped your crystals nucleate. I would assume that even the resonance frequency of the linbro plates are low, and may cause disturbances in them. However, fire alarm systems usually are of a much higher frequency (shrill whines and stuff ), and so they may not affect the linbro plates. Ganesh On Fri, 22 Jan 2010 17:08:41 +0100, [email protected] wrote: When working on tobacco Rubisco in Los Angeles, we got the best crystals of the activated form of the protein after small earthquakes (4-5 on the richter scale). However, as people in the lab. noticed, this earthquake parameter is somewhat difficult to control. Handling the linbro plates sometimes caused massive nucleation: I would look at a plate with only clear drops and by the time I would put the plate back in the incubator there was so much nucleation that the plate was of no use any more. When the nucleation of your protein is sensitive to vibrations, I would worry more about handling than about the fire alarm. Best, Herman ------------------------- FROM: CCP4 bulletin board [mailto:[email protected]] ON BEHALF OF Jacqueline Vitali SENT: Friday, January 22, 2010 3:14 PM TO: [email protected] SUBJECT: [ccp4bb] question on the effect of a fire alarm on crystallization Dear all, Does anyone know the effect of a fire alarm placed in the same room where one grows crystals? (1) On trays placed inside styrofoam boxes (2) On trays placed inside an incubator which has not been tested as vibration free. Thank you. Jackie Vitali -- What is true for E. coli is also true for an elephant - Jacques Monod.
