In a previous article the important role of protein crystallography in the optimisation of drug candidates was highlighted. An essential part of this process is establishing robust protein crystallisation systems that can be used for both soaking and co-crystallisation experiments. This may mean producing many hundreds of X-ray quality crystals in a reproducible and timely manner and, despite the progress made in expression and purification of proteins for structural studies, this is not always trivial. This article outlines the practice of Automated Matrix Seeding and its increasing importance in the pharmaceutical industry.

We are currently living in an exciting age, where for the fist time ever, human diseases are being understood at a molecular level. Protein crystallography plays a major role in this understanding because proteins, being the major machinery of living things, are often the targets for drugs.