Comparison of the three-dimensional structures of a human Bence-Jones dimer crystallized on earth and aboard US Space Shuttle Mission STS-95

Abstract

Crystals of a human (Sea) Bence-Jones dimer were produced in a capillary by vapor diffusion under microgravity conditions in the 9 day US Space Shuttle Mission STS-95. In comparison to ground-based experiments, nucleation was facile and spontaneous in space. Appearance of a very large (8 × 1.6 × 1.0 mm) crystal in a short time period is a strong endorsement for the use of microgravity to produce crystals sufficiently large for neutron diffraction studies. The Sea dimer crystallized in the orthorhombic space group P212121, with a = 48.9 Å, b = 85.2 Å, and c = 114.0 Å. The crystals grown in microgravity exhibited significantly lower mosaicities than those of ground-based crystals and the X-ray..