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Updated: Dec 13, 2025

$Microcrystal Electron Diffraction of Small Molecules$

Microcrystal Electron Diffraction of Small Molecules

Published on: March 15, 2021

Visualizing drug binding interactions using microcrystal electron diffraction.

Max T B Clabbers¹, S Zoë Fisher^2,3, Mathieu Coinçon^4,5

¹Department of Materials and Environmental Chemistry, Stockholm University, 106 91, Stockholm, Sweden.

Communications Biology

|August 2, 2020

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Microcrystal electron diffraction (MicroED) now visualizes drug binding to proteins like human carbonic anhydrase II. This breakthrough enables detailed structural insights for drug discovery and fragment screening.

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Published on: April 24, 2018

Area of Science:

Structural biology
Biophysics
Drug discovery

Background:

Visualizing ligand binding is crucial for structure-based drug design and fragment screening.
Microcrystal electron diffraction (MicroED) offers potential for studying drug binding in small macromolecular crystals.
Previous studies have not unambiguously resolved drug binding interactions using electron diffraction alone.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the utility of MicroED for visualizing drug binding interactions.
To resolve the binding of a sulfonamide inhibitor to human carbonic anhydrase isoform II (HCA II).

Main Methods:

Utilizing MicroED on a conventional transmission electron microscope.
Collecting diffraction data from thin, hydrated microcrystals of HCA II soaked with acetazolamide (AZM).

Main Results:

High-quality MicroED data were efficiently collected from HCA II microcrystals.
The bound acetazolamide inhibitor was unequivocally fitted and resolved within the HCA II structure.
Demonstrated the capability of MicroED to resolve drug-protein interactions.

Conclusions:

MicroED is a viable method for visualizing drug binding interactions at high resolution.
MicroED can complement existing structural biology techniques like X-ray and neutron diffraction.
This technique holds promise for facilitating in-house fragment screening in drug discovery.