Lysosome Crystals in Emulsion

Lysosome Crystals in Emulsion

Caroline McCue
Varanasi Research Group

MIT Department of Mechanical Engineering

This image is of an emulsion of protein solution within oil captured within a glass tube. Like salts, proteins also form crystals, and within each of these droplets, a protein crystal has formed. I took this image as a part of a time lapse to track how long it took for protein crystals to form within drops in order to measure protein nucleation kinetics. The protein used here is lysozyme, which is a model protein used for crystallization research.  The most exciting thing about this image is the repeatable way crystals have grown perfectly one within each identical droplet.

nine rows of fifteen-ish drops with crystals in them

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