Course descriptionResearch in the School of Crystallography focuses on the structure and function of biological macromolecules and their role in diseases. The primary techniques used in the department are X-ray crystallography and single particle electron microscopy, biophysics and bioinformatics, with protein NMR spectroscopy based just across the road at University College London. The biological topics studied include: mechanism of bacterial pathogenesis and toxicity; modelling the immune system; stress and chaperone proteins; cataract; membrane proteins; cytoskeleton and muscle proteins; cell signalling; DNA division and repair.
Study resources
The School is equipped with X-ray generators, image plates and diffractometers for X-ray crystallography, and instrumentation for cryo-electron microscopy and associated image processing. There are facilities for UV and CD spectroscopy, electrospray mass spectrometry, calorimetry, fluorescence spectroscopy, ultracentrifugation, and protein expression and purification in the biochemical and molecular biology laboratories. We have a 158 processor cluster for intensive data processing. All areas have specialised computer equipment for data analysis, molecular graphics and molecular modelling.
Because we have a large number of PhD students, we can run a formal lecture programme which includes graduate studies (Science in the Real World), transferable skills, modern techniques, and a lecture course on Principles and Practice of Structural Biology, especially for PhD students. In addition, our PhD students are encouraged to sit in on any appropriate lectures from our MSc Bioinformatics with Systems Biology. Also, they have access to our Web-based courses in Principles of Protein Structure, Protein Crystallography, and Techniques in Structural Molecular Biology.
Special features
The School of Crystallography received a grade of 5A in the most recent Research Assessment Exercise.
The department forms part of the Institute of Structural Molecular Biology (ISMB), a joint initiative with University College London. The ISMB has a biophysics laboratory, which opened in November 2006.