Get Excited, Be Critical

09/26 

In the latest Education Corner, David Goodsell asks readers to Get Excited, Be Critical when storytelling and describes his new book on Atomic Evidence: Seeing the Molecular Basis of Life. David is the author of the Molecule of the Month, a series at the RCSB Protein Data Bank that presents the structure and function of a new molecule each month, and several illustrated books on biological molecules, their diverse roles within living cells, and the growing connections between biology and nanotechnology.

Published quarterly in our Newsletter, each Education Corner offers an account of how members of the community use the PDB to educate students. If you would like to submit an Education Corner column, please send an email to info@rcsb.org.

The Summer 2017 issue of the RCSB PDB Newsletter also celebrates Director Emerita Helen Berman’s ACA award, describes upcoming changes to the FTP archive, and shows how to access structural variations using PDBFlex data.

RCSB PDB's Newsletter is published and archived online.

Evolution of cytochrome c can be observed using structures in the PDB archive, by hypothesizing that proteins that are most similar in sequence correspond to organisms that are most closely related. In this illustration, the human enzyme is in red, amino acids that are different in other organisms are colored pink if they are chemically similar, and white if they are completely different. Based on this information, you can build a family tree such as the one shown below the structures. Image from the book Atomic Evidence, using PDB entries 3zcf, 2i8b, 1hrc, 1cyc and 2i8b)