This isn’t a scene from outer space but rather a microscope image of part of one well in a 24-well crystallization plate. And if you look carefully inside the spheres, you’ll see tiny protein crystals forming. Structural biochemist Saacnicteh Toledo-Patino captured this photo during her work at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, where she’s a principal investigator probing the evolution of simple peptides into complex cellular machines. “Growing protein crystals is anything but simple,” she says. “Some crystals appear within days, while many never grow at all.”
Submitted by Saacnicteh Toledo-Patino
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