Three-dimensional structures of biological macromolecules have a huge impact on our understanding of biology at the molecular level. Increasingly, the limiting factor in obtaining structural information is the production of materials suitable for structural study. This means sufficient quantities of pure, stable, active macromolecules, their fragments or complexes. High-throughput technologies that were developed for large projects of genome sequencing, structural genomics and proteomics also can be applied to classic, problem based structural biology. A group of investigators at Purdue University whose research focuses on structural biology wish to adopt these new technologies for parallel, small-scale production of macromolecules. All of the investigators have projects that would benefit enormously from broad sampling of biological sources, expression constructs, expression conditions and purification protocols for the target molecules. This proposal seeks instruments for parallel cloning, expression, purification and crystallization. Use of these instruments would fundamentally alter the way in which the investigators approach their research problems and would greatly enhance their productivity. The requested instruments are: a liquid-handling robot for cloning and expression, an automated colony picker, an automated chromatography system, and a crystallization robot with photographic monitoring system.
