Cryo-EM

Cryo-EM has emerged as the leading technique for structure determination of membrane proteins and large protein / protein-nucleic acid complexes.

Evotec offers a complete solution for cryo-EM projects:

• Construct and complex formation design: stabilizing, increasing particle size and reducing preferential orientation of proteins at the protein preparation level to enable high-resolution structure determination via cryo-EM, including use of Fabs and nanobodies
• Negative stain: identification of size, shape, oligomeric state and aggregation of proteins
• Cryo-EM screening and data collection: rapid throughput to optimized, reproducible vitrified grids for each project. Propriety access to the latest microscopes and detectors as they emerge
• Data processing, model building and refinement: complete workflow, using multiple software packages tailored to each project

Evotec has specialized expertise in membrane protein structure solutions to support drug discovery pipelines for this challenging class of targets:

• Diverse expertise across many classes (e.g. GPCRs, ion channels, solute carriers, bacterial membrane proteins)
• Rigid, IP-free tagging strategies to stabilize smaller membrane proteins and antagonist GPCR systems, detergent and lipid screening, optimizing for monodisperse and thermostable preparations
• Membrane proteins pose unique challenges during the structure determination process: optimization to achieve well dispersed protein across the cryo-EM grid, data processing strategies to better resolve membrane domains