Cryo bio-crystallography is the application of crystallography

Crystallography

Crystallography is the experimental science of the arrangement of atoms in solids. The word "crystallography" derives from the Greek words crystallon = cold drop / frozen drop, with its meaning extending to all solids with some degree of transparency, and grapho = write.Before the development of...

 at cryogenic temperatures.

Basic principles

Cryo crystallography enables X-ray

X-ray

X-radiation is a form of electromagnetic radiation. X-rays have a wavelength in the range of 0.01 to 10 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30 petahertz to 30 exahertz and energies in the range 120 eV to 120 keV. They are shorter in wavelength than UV rays and longer than gamma...

 data collection at cryogenic, near liquid nitrogen temperatures (also called: N2).

1. Crystals are transferred from mother liquor to a hydrocarbon environment
2. Crystals are mounted with a glass fiber (as opposed to a capillary)
3. Crystals are cooled with a cold nitrogen stream on a diffraction apparatus to prevent the solvent freezing in the crystals thus maintaining crystallographic integrity.

Advantages

1. Significant improvement of resolution in data collection
2. Reduced or eliminated radiation damage in crystals

Usefulness and applications

Crystallography of large biological macromolecules can be achieved while maintaining their solution state. The most known example is the ribosome

Ribosome

A ribosome is a component of cells that assembles the twenty specific amino acid molecules to form the particular protein molecule determined by the nucleotide sequence of an RNA molecule....

.