Acquisition of an X-ray Generator/Detector System to Support NIH Research

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 DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The University of Georgia has a strong and growing structural biology community with two new faculty hired and challenging proposals funded. To meet increasing demand for structures, address a major bottleneck to UGA research (the lack of an in-house X-ray system) and to increase the overall productivity of UGA structural biology we propose to purchase a modern X-ray data collection system consisting of: 1) a microfocus X-ray generator; 2) goniometer; 3) photon counting detector; 4) cryo-cooling system to replace our aging X-ray system which has been down for over three years. The system will allow in-house screening and data collection for the first time since 2012. It will facilitate data collection fro smaller crystals and those with large unit cells, and will provide a cost effective approach to maintaining this vital resource that is shared among more than a dozen productive researchers. The capabilities and performance of the new instrumentation will be exploited to tackle a diverse collection of important biomedical research topics. These include general issues in protein chemistry, methods development for structural biology, glycoproteins and glycobiology, post-translational modification, kinase regulation, transcription, retinal permeability, calcium signalig, virus biology, iron-sulfur cluster assembly, membrane-protein interactions, endotoxin-receptor interactions, developmental biology, and others Thus, the instrument will have an immediate and lasting impact on UGA biomedical research programs supported by NIH in areas such as cancer, diabetes, sepsis, anemias, ataxias, bacterial and viral infections and many others. Specific benefits include: Increased productivity: The X-ray system will enable us to quickly screen crystals before sending them to the synchrotron freeing up valuable beam time that we now use for screening. Compared to our current system, new X-ray diffraction system will allow us to screen smaller crystals and crystals having larger unit cells. In- house: data collection: Datasets of improved quality will be collected much more rapidly and from smaller crystals than were previously possible. The system will also provide data for low priority projects and during times when the APS is down. Increased competitiveness: by addressing the current structural biology bottleneck at UGA the X-ray system will result in more users, more data, more results and increased competitiveness for UGA in attracting the best students, faculty and funding. Cost savings. Infrastructure and maintenance costs will be considerably lower with the more energy efficient system.