Microcrystal electron diffraction in macromolecular and pharmaceutical structure determination

Abstract

Microcrystal electron diffraction (MicroED) has recently shown to be a promising technique for structure determination in structural biology and pharmaceutical chemistry. Here, we discuss the unique properties of electrons and motivate its use for diffraction experiments. We review the latest developments in MicroED, and illustrate its applications in macromolecular crystallography, fragment screening and structure guided drug discovery. We discuss the perspectives of MicroED in synthetic chemistry and pharmaceutical development. We anticipate that the rapid advances MicroED showcased here will promote further development of electron crystallography and open up new opportunities for drug discovery.

Keywords: 3DED; Electron crystallography; Electron diffraction; Fragment screening; Ligand binding; MicroED; Pharmaceuticals; Structural biology.