High-speed crystallography - How to deliver the sample?
What is it about?
X-ray crystallography is a powerful tool to understand the tree-dimensional structure of molecules. To extend the method to measure dynamics of enzyme structures - enzymes are molecules that aid chemical reactions to enable life, a serial approach is needed to follow irreversible reactions. These measurements typically need long time to collect the necessary data. With the advent of X-ray lasers with high repetition rates, these times can be vastly reduced. We present a necessary technique to make use of these new X-ray lasers. Here,we are using a very fast stream of sample suspension to deliver the sample crystals to the X-ray beam at a sufficient rate.
Why is it important?
Our experiments are the first experiments that demonstrate a delivery method capable of replenishing the sample fast enough for the novel X-ray lasers. These new facilities can produce X-ray pulses at MHz rates (one million pulses per second). We have successfully collected crystal diffraction data from X-ray pulses at that rate using the FLASH X-ray laser in Hamburg.