Acoustic Injectors Meet X-Ray Free-Electron Lasers

Area of Science:

• Structural biology
• Biophysics
• Crystallography

Background:

• Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) is a powerful technique for determining protein structures.
• High sample consumption is a major limitation for SFX experiments.
• Efficient sample delivery is critical for maximizing data collection.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel acoustic sample injection technique for SFX.
• To demonstrate the potential of this method to reduce sample requirements.
• To evaluate its impact on sample preparation technologies.

Main Methods:

• Development and implementation of an acoustic injection system.
• Integration of the acoustic injector with free-electron laser sources.
• Testing and characterization of sample delivery efficiency and consumption.

Main Results:

• The acoustic injection method significantly reduces the amount of sample needed per shot.
• Consistent and focused delivery of samples into the X-ray beam was achieved.
• The method shows promise for enabling SFX experiments with limited sample quantities.

Conclusions:

• Acoustic injection offers a substantial improvement in sample utilization for SFX.
• This technique is a valuable addition to the toolkit for preparing samples for serial femtosecond crystallography.
• Further adoption of this method could accelerate structural studies of challenging biomolecules.