Meetings & Courses Program

Crossroads of Biology

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Macromolecular Crystallography
October 11 - 27, 2026

Key Dates:
Application Deadline: August 14, 2026
Arrival: October 11th by 6pm EST
Departure: October 27th

CSHL Courses are intensive, running all day and often including evenings and weekends; students are expected to attend all sessions and reside on campus for the duration of the course.

Instructors
Paul Adams, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Dorothee Liebschner, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Janet Newman, UNSW, Australia
James Pflugrath, Rigaku Americas Corporation (ret.), Texas

Co-Instructor:
Tom Peat, UNSW, Australia

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See the roll of honor - who's taken the course in the past.

X-ray crystallography has been the cornerstone of structural biology for half a century and remains the technique of choice for atomic resolution understanding of macromolecules and for structure guided drug discovery. This intense course combines laboratory and computational instruction to train course participants in the major techniques used to determine three-dimensional structures. It is designed for scientists with a working knowledge of protein structure and function, but who are new to macromolecular crystallography or who wish to increase their in-depth knowledge of macromolecular crystallography. The advent of methods for the accurate prediction of protein structures is accelerating crystallography experiments, and the course will train researchers in how to best use these models.

Topics to be covered include:

  • Basic Diffraction Theory
  • Structure Presentation
  • Coordinate Deposition
  • Structure Validation
  • Model Building and Refinement
  • Electron Density Maps Improvement
  • Using Predicted Models in Structure Solution and Completion
  • Protein Structure Prediction
  • Structure Solution by Experimental Phasing Methods (SAD, MAD, MIR, and others) and Molecular Replacement
  • Data Collection and Processing
  • Synchrotron X-ray Sources and Optics
  • Crystallization (Proteins, Nucleic Acids, Complexes and Membrane Proteins)

Participants have extensive hands-on training in well-equipped labs in how to crystallize proteins and determine crystal structures by several methods, while learning through lectures on theory and methods. Both basic and advanced subjects are covered during lectures, which are given by leaders in the field. Informal discussions behind the techniques are frequent and students are expected to pose questions to be answered in interactive sessions

Applicants should be familiar with the creation and editing of simple text files on Linux workstations.

2026 Invited Speakers
Terese Bergfors, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden 
Dominika Borek, UT Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX 
Martin Caffrey, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland 
Vincent Chen, Duke University, Durham, NC 
Oliver Clarke, Columbia University, New York, NY 
Kay Diederichs, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany 
Paul Emsley, Medical Research Council, Cambridge, United Kingdom 
James Holton, UCSF/LBNL/SLAC, Berkeley, CA 
Robbie Joosten, Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam, Netherlands 
Qun Liu, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY 
Airlie McCoy, Univeristy of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom 
Alexander McPherson, Univ. California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 
Flora Meilleur, Oak Ridge Nat Lab / North Carolina State Univ, Oak Ridge, TN 
Anastassis Perrakis, Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam, Netherlands 
Randy Read, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom 
Jane Richardson, Duke University, Durham, NC 
Jose Rodriguez, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 
Clyde Smith, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 
Thomas Terwilliger, New Mexico Consortium, Santa Fe, NM 
Andrea Thorn, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany 
Clemens Vonrhein, Global Phasing Ltd., Cambridge, United Kingdom 
Christopher Williams, Duke University, Durham, NC 


Support & Stipends:


We would like to acknowledge the following companies that provided invaluable support:

Equipment: JAN Scientific, Inc., Mettler-Toledo Rainin, LLC

Donations: MiTeGen LLC, SPT Labtech Ltd

Stipends are available to offset tuition costs as follows:


        

Please indicate your eligibility for funding in your stipend request submitted when you apply to the course. Stipend requests do not affect selection decisions made by the instructors.

Cost (including board and lodging): $5,300 USD

No fees are due until you have completed the full application process and are accepted into the course. 

Before applying, ensure you have (all due July 15):
  1. Personal statement/essay;
  2. Letter(s) of recommendation;
  3. Curriculum vitae/resume (optional);
  4. Financial aid request (optional).
    More details.

If you are not ready to fully apply but wish to express interest in applying, receive a reminder two weeks prior to the deadline, and tell us about your financial aid requirements, click below: