Crystal Management¶
ROCK MAKER enables you to centralize your synchrotron trip documentation, from marking a crystal as harvested, storing it in a particular puck or dewar, to noting whether or not the diffraction data have been collected and to what resolution. This record centralization helps you design future experiments. To track your crystals effectively, you should understand the process of documenting your crystal harvests and synchrotron trips.
![Crystal Tracking Flowchart](../../../_images/crystal_tracking_flowchart1.png)
Crystal Tracking Flowchart
Crystal tracking covers the following process.
1. Harvesting Crystals Virtually
After finding a crystal hit in ROCK MAKER, you can virtually harvest the crystal before assigning it to a synchrotron trip. For more information, read Virtual Crystal Harvesting.
OPTIONAL: Adding and Assigning Cryoprotectants and Soaking Ingredients
If necessary, you can add and assign cryoprotectants and soaking ingredients to the harvested crystals. Go to Adding Cryoprotectants and Soaking Ingredients and Assigning Cryoprotectants and Soaking Ingredients to learn more.
2. Assigning Crystals to a Synchrotron Trip
After harvesting the crystals virtually, you can assign them to a synchrotron trip in ROCK MAKER. This feature enables you to document the pucks and dewars you use to keep your crystals and the crystal analysis you get from the synchrotron facilities. Go to Synchrotron Trip Page for further details.
3. Harvesting Crystals in the Laboratory
Once you harvest your crystals virtually and assign them to a synchrotron trip, you can harvest them in your laboratory.
4. Assigning Crystals to a Puck and a Dewar
Before sending crystals to a synchrotron facility, you need to assign them to pucks and dewars from ROCK MAKER or use the CSV files. It will keep them safe during the trip.
5. Sending the Crystals to the Synchrotron Facility for Analysis
Your crystals will be sent to the synchrotron facility alongside the printed synchrotron trip information (if you have any) for analysis.
6. Collecting the Crystal Data
When the analysis process in the synchrotron facility is complete, it will send you the analysis results or upload them to its website. Once you receive the data, you can mark your crystal as collected in ROCK MAKER. Read more on Synchrotron Trip Page.
7. Inputting Crystal Analysis Results
You can manually input a crystal analysis result or import a synchrotron trip CSV file to your ROCK MAKER.