Consortium for operation of a protein crystallographic synchrotron beamline

同步加速器设施提供的x射线辐射源既高度准直，又比传统x射线源的通量大得多。这些因素使结构生物学家受益匪浅，使x射线衍射方法能够阐明生物、医学和工业上重要的大分子。此外，需要使用同步辐射的多波长异常衍射（MAD）技术的发展，通过显着减少求解蛋白质结构所需的时间，彻底改变了大分子结构的确定。因此，在过去几年中，蛋白质晶体学家对同步加速器设备的需求急剧增加也就不足为奇了。在这种趋势下，获得同步加速器设备已成为一种宝贵的商品。由于加拿大直到最近才拥有同步加速器设施，需要同步加速器辐射进行研究的加拿大科学家一直处于相当困难的境地。随着加拿大光源（CLS）在2006年的某个时候开放，这种情况正在改变，预计2007- 2008年将全面运行第一条蛋白质晶体学光束线。然而，在此之前，基于加拿大同步加速器的蛋白质晶体学研究仍必须在加拿大以外进行。多用户访问授权申请旨在为加拿大蛋白质晶体学家联盟提供访问同步加速器设施的资金。为了确保继续访问，我们将继续参与目前在纽约厄普顿布鲁克海文国家实验室的国家同步加速器光源进行MAD实验的蛋白质晶体学束流线的操作，直到CLS开发出足以满足加拿大晶体学家需求的数据收集能力。

Synchrotron facilities provide a source of X-ray radiation that is both highly collimated and of much greater flux than can be attained on conventional X-ray sources. These factors have greatly benefited structural biologist, enabling the elucidation of large biologically, medically and industrially important macromolecules by X-ray diffraction methods. In addition, the development of Multiwavelength Anomalous Diffraction (MAD) techniques, which demand the use of synchrotron radiation, have revolutionized macromolecular structure determinations by significantly reducing the time needed to solve a protein structure. Thus, it is not surprising that the demand for access to synchrotron facilities by protein crystallographers has dramatically increased over the last few years. Given this trend, access to synchrotron facilities has become a precious commodity. Canadian scientists whose research requires synchrotron radiation had been in a rather difficult situation since Canada did not have a synchrotron facility until recently. This situation is changing with the Canadian Light Source (CLS) opening sometime in 2006, and anticipated full operation of the first protein crystallography beamline foreseen in 2007-8. Until then, however, Canadian synchrotron-based protein crystallography research must still be conducted outside of Canada. The Multi-User Access grant application is intended to providing funding for a Canadian consortium of protein crystallographers to access synchrotron facilities. To ensure continued access, we would maintain our current participation in the operation of a protein crystallography beam line capable of performing MAD experiments at the National Synchrotron Light Source, Brookhaven National Laboratories in Upton, New York until data collection capacity sufficient to satisfy need of Canadian crystallographers is developed at CLS.