Envelope skeletonization as a means to determine monomer masks and non-crystallographic symmetry relationships: application in the solution of the structure of fibrinogen fragment D
G. Spraggon, Envelope skeletonization as a means to determine monomer masks and non-crystallographic symmetry relationships: application in the solution of the structure of fibrinogen fragment D, ACT CRYST D, 55, 1999, pp. 458-463
An algorithm is described which utilizes the solvent mask generated by the
solvent-flattening technique to calculate a monomer molecular envelope. In
the case where non-crystallographic symmetry (NCS) is present in the crysta
l and self-rotation angles are known from a self-rotation function, the res
ultant monomer envelopes can be used to search for the translation componen
t of the NCS element by a three-dimensional search in real space. In the ab
sence of self-rotation angles, the monomer envelope may be used to derive t
he NCS operators by reciprocal-space techniques, Thus, an automatic procedu
re for averaging directly from the solvent-flattening stage can be implemen
ted. The procedure was instrumental in the structure solution of fibrinogen
fragment D, which is presented as an example.