Methods
Methods used at BCIV
We currently use all structural biology methods, ranging from NMR spectroscopy to cryo-EM, X-ray crystallography and small-angle scattering. Our chair hosts the high-field state-of-the-art NMR spectrometers of the North Bavarian NMR Centre (NBNC), including 600, 700, 900 MHz and the 1 GHz spectrometers. The 700, 900 and 1GHz spectrometer are equipped with cryo probes. We therefore have a focus on employing NMR to understand biomolecular systems, i.e. structure and dynamics and their relation to function.
NMR is a very powerful and versatile technique, enabling us to probe interactions between biomolecules (protein-protein, protein-peptide, protein-RNA, protein-DNA, protein-small molecule, RNA-RNA etc. interactions) and to assess dynamics of our samples in all time scales ranging from picoseconds to days (see below). The latter is especially useful for studying the dark matter of the proteome, namely intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) and their involvement in biomolecular condensation. For more details about NMR see below.
We have frequent beam time for X-ray crystallography and small angle scattering at the ESRF Grenoble and DESY Hamburg synchrotrons. Cryo-EM we currently use via our co-affiliation with the EMBL Heidelberg until end of 2025.
We further enrich and accelerate our research with usage of AI-based structure prediction methods.
Apart from that, we have the following biophysical instruments in our labs (see also gallery below): CD spectroscopy, fluorescence spectrophotometry (also 96-well plate reader), fluorescent gel reader etc. and will invest further during the next three years. We have a fully operational new Thermofisher Vitrobot system in-house to prepare cryo-EM grids.
To prepare our samples, we have state-of-the-art molecular biology facilities for protein expression in E. coli and insect cells (dedicated lab) as well as for RNA in vitro transcription. We have four high-end FPLC systems (Biorad-NGC and Äkta Purifier) for biomolecular sample purification and an HPLC for RNA purification. We have an entire lab dedicated for RNA research (incl. radioactively labelled RNA).” Pictures of all facilities are shown below.
Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR):
- Read more about NMR as tool for analyzing biomolecular dynamics:Hide
- Read more about modern NMR data acquisition and processing:Hide
- Read more about NMR-based structure determination:Hide
Photo gallery
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|
|
![]() |
|