Program Structural Biology and Crystallography Crystals can be formed from a variety of substances. Protein crystals are one type. As we will discuss, one of the reasons they are investigated is to understand how a virus attacks our cells. Many diseases are associated with protein dysfunction. Sickle cell anemia, for example, is a hereditary human disorder caused by a defective form of the protein hemoglobin.
Viruses inject their genetic material into healthy human cells.
The viral proteins that are expressed can be detrimental to the infected host. If scientists can determine what the protein molecule looks like chemically and structurally in three dimensions, they can make hypothesis about how a particular place on the molecule helps a particular chemical reaction take place. This science is called structural biology. Structural biology is the study of the relationship of a biomolecular structure to its function in the cell. Here we focus on proteins and how resolving their structural features can help us understand their roles in life processes A protein's structure and its function are interdependent.