The Nobel prize in chemistry will be awarded for cryoelectron microscopy
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced the Nobel prize in chemistry in 2017.
The official presentation of awards and medals will take place on 10 December, after reading the traditional lectures. A live webcast of the announcement of the winner was carried on the website of the Nobel Committee.
Cryoelectron microscopy is a technique allowing to determine the structure of proteins, and thus, do not require difficult, and often impossible growing a single crystal of the biomolecule.
It is as follows. In the first step the protein solution is frozen, creating a very thin layer so that the protein molecules do not obscure each other when viewed from the top down. Then using the electron microscope, scientists have image of this thin layer, containing hundreds of thousands of photographs of protein in different “angles”. In the last step these images are glued together in a single three-dimensional object from which to determine structure of a protein is extremely important for the development of new drugs or for understanding how our cells.
Cryo-EM makes it possible to portray biomolecules after them very fast freezing (vitrification method) so its natural shape is preserved. pic.twitter.com/SXgeAVUk24
— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 4, 2017
Now the method cryoelectron microscopy is actively used by scientists. For example, it has installed the surface structure of the virus, Zeke, various proteins, including recognizing the beginning of a gene controlling circadian rhythms, which provides the sensitivity of cells to pressure.