Toolbox for optical spectroscopy in crystals

What is it about?

This article presents a software developed to correct baseline artefacts encountered on UV-vis absorption spectra recorded in protein crystals. This software is encased in a graphical interface. It also features tools to analyse UV-vis absorption or fluorescence spectra. The article also explains which optical phenomena occur when measuring optical spectroscopy data in crystals, how they cause baseline artefacts and which measurement strategy can minimise their impact.

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Photo by Nowshad Arefin on Unsplash

Photo by Nowshad Arefin on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Transient or steady UV-vis absorption spectroscopy in protein crystals is one of the most prominent complementary methods used to validate the electronic and protonation states of redox cofactors, chromophores, metals and metal centres. There has been renewed interest in recording such data with the rise of time-resolved crystallography. But recording meaningful UV-vis data in protein crystals is not trivial. The software presented in this article intends to make it as easy as possible to get feedback on the quality of the recorded spectra and correct them if needed, so that they can be compared to in-solution data.