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Figure 3
(a) 144 crystallization experiments were set up using a mother liquor containing 10 mg ml−1 hen egg-white lysozyme in 20 mM sodium acetate pH 4.6, 1 M NaCl, in volumes of 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128 and 256 nl (all in 16-fold). In the smaller volumes (1–8 nl) needle-shaped crystals predominated (see also Fig. 2[link]), whereas in the larger volumes bulky tetragonal crystals appeared. The graph shows the average number of tetragonal crystals per droplet that appeared after 24 h as a function of the volume of the droplet. The straight line is a linear fit: (number of crystals) = 0.5 + 0.011 nl−1 × (volume of droplet), with a correlation coefficient of 0.95. (b) In the experiment described in (a), needle-shaped crystals appeared predominantly in the smaller volumes. The frequency with which these crystals appeared within 24 h is plotted as a function of the surface-to-volume ratio of the droplets, assuming a spherical shape. Note that in the larger surface-to-volume ratios (corresponding to the 1, 2 and 4 nl droplets) we still always found crystals, but these were mostly of the `sea-urchin' type.

Journal logoBIOLOGICAL
CRYSTALLOGRAPHY
ISSN: 1399-0047
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