New synchrotron radiation circular dichroism end-station on DISCO beamline at SOLEIL synchrotron for biomolecular...

The novel Synchrotron Radiation Circular Dichroism (SRCD) technique is becoming a new tool of investigation for the molecular structures of biomolecules, like proteins, carbohydrates or others bio-materials. Here, we describe the characteristics of a new experimental end-station for circular dichroism studies, in construction on DISCO beamline at SOLEIL synchrotron (Saint-Aubin, France). This experimental end-station will be an open facility for the community of researchers in structural biology. In order to show the kind of information accessible with this type of technique, we give an example: the conformational study of the galactose mutarotase from Escherichia coli, an enzyme involved in the galactose metabolism. This study was made using an operational SRCD station available at SRS (Daresbury Laboratory, UK).