Using X-Ray Crystallography to Simplify and Accelerate Biologics Drug Development. 
Every major biopharmaceutical company incorporates a protein crystallography unit that is central to its structure-based drug discovery efforts.  Yet these capabilities are rarely leveraged toward the formal higher order structural characterization that is so challenging but integral to large-scale biologics manufacturing.  Although the biotech industry laments the shortcomings of its favored biophysical techniques, x-ray crystallography is not even considered for drug development.  Why not?  We suggest that this is due, at least in part, to outdated thinking (for a recent industry-wide survey, see Gabrielson JP, Weiss IV WF.  Technical decision-making with higher order structure data: starting a new dialogue.  J Pharm Sci.  2015;104(4):1240-1245).  We examine some myths surrounding protein crystallography and highlight the inherent properties of protein crystals (molecular identity, biochemical purity, conformational uniformity, and macromolecular crowding) as having practicable commonalities with today's patient-focused liquid drug products.  In the new millennium, protein crystallography has become essentially a routine analytical test.  Its application may aid the identification of better candidate molecules that are more amenable to high-concentration processing, formulation, and analysis thereby helping to make biologics drug development quicker, simpler, and cheaper.