Seeing the chemistry in biology using neutron crystallography

Public Talk of ILL Scientific Council
Wednesday 31 March 2021, at 3.30 pm

“Seeing the chemistry in biology using neutron crystallography”
by Matthew Blakeley,  LSS Group

Institut Laue-Langevin

Hydrogen atoms and protons play critical roles in biological structure and function. Neutron crystallography allows us to directly visualise their locations in damage-free crystal structures of biological macromolecules and their complexes at room-temperature, revealing key details of protonation, hydrogen-bonding and hydration.  Here I will describe (i) the current status of the field using examples of recent studies performed and (ii) on-going instrument developments that will further extend the limits for neutron macromolecular crystallography.