Welcome my Xtal pages

Crystal, crystallogenesis, crystallography...

Claude's picture space

I am a senior scientist (directeur de recherche) at the Institut de Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire (CNRS), leader of the new team "Structure, evolution and dynamics of tRNA:protein complexes" and president of the French Crystallographic Association. My research is focussed on the interactions between proteins and nucleic acids and my main investigation tool is X-ray crystallography. How do I get 3D information on my favorite biomolecules? I first grow crystals from the target biomolecules. These crystals are then characterized by X-ray diffraction in order to derive a three-dimensionnal structure of the targets. This 3D picture is eventually analyzed to understand how these biomolecules interact, how they perform specific biological tasks in the cell and how mutations can affect their function. The main steps of such a structural study are shown Movie in the figure below. I also produced a movie in the laboratory to explained this process with more details. This movie is freely available for teaching purposes.


The most difficult step in this scenario is very often the crystallization. Getting good crystals of a biomolecule is not an easy task due to the many physical chemical and biological parameters that are involved in the crystallization process. Indeed, I am particularly interested in this part of the job called biocrystallogenesis. This site provides a few details on my favorite research topics and more general informations about the field of biological crystallogenesis.

Counter-diffusion crystal

More details on

Claude Sauter © 2003-2024
Structure, evolution and dynamics of tRNA:protein complexes - UPR 9002 - CNRS
Institut de Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire
Université de Strasbourg
2 Allée Conrad Roentgen - 67084 Strasbourg - France
tel +33 388 417 109 - fax  +33 388 602 218
c.sauter[AT]ibmc-cnrs.unistra.fr

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