Dear Careina These look like crystals indeed. Without more information, I can make some educated guesses but the ultimate proof is in your hands :)
1. they don't have to be spherulites. Note that low-symmetry crystals can have edge-less habits, especially P1 are notorious for that - I've had crystals looking like grape seeds or even spheres/eggs (i.e. not a single straight edge) and they diffracted well and weren't twinned. So these can be just crystals (but not diffracting ones, sadly) 2. when you write that these objects are 'hard' - did you actually crush them with a metal needle? Do they 'pop' or 'squish'? If they make cracking noises, they're salt or small molecule crystals. It might not hurt to try and set them up in oil drops without cryo, to see if this 'cheap room temperature' diffraction experiment reveals protein like lattice. Of course this requires hands on access to a diffractometer, which these days isn't a common thing. All the best, Artem - Cosmic Cats approve of this message On Wed, Nov 8, 2023 at 10:02 AM careinaedgo...@yahoo.com < 000002531c126adf-dmarc-requ...@jiscmail.ac.uk> wrote: > Hi all > We have been trying with no success to crystalize a protein. Recently we > got these strange shape "crystals". They are hard and flat but they do not > diffract at all. Any ideas as to what could cause this? > Careina > > ------------------------------ > > To unsubscribe from the CCP4BB list, click the following link: > https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/WA-JISC.exe?SUBED1=CCP4BB&A=1 > ######################################################################## To unsubscribe from the CCP4BB list, click the following link: https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/WA-JISC.exe?SUBED1=CCP4BB&A=1 This message was issued to members of www.jiscmail.ac.uk/CCP4BB, a mailing list hosted by www.jiscmail.ac.uk, terms & conditions are available at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/policyandsecurity/
