Quantitative imaging of single, unstained viruses with coherent x rays.
We report the recording and reconstruction of x-ray diffraction patterns from single, unstained viruses, for the first time. By separating the diffraction pattern of the virus particles from that of their surroundings, we performed quantitative and high-contrast imaging of a single virion. The structure of the viral capsid inside a virion was visualized. This work opens the door for quantitative x-ray imaging of a broad range of specimens from protein machineries and viruses to cellular organelles. Moreover, our experiment is directly transferable to the use of x-ray free electron lasers, and represents an experimental milestone towards the x-ray imaging of large protein complexes.
Song
Changyong
C
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Los Angeles, California 90095, USA.
Jiang
Huaidong
H
Mancuso
Adrian
A
Amirbekian
Bagrat
B
Peng
Li
L
Sun
Ren
R
Shah
Sanket S
SS
Zhou
Z Hong
ZH
Ishikawa
Tetsuya
T
Miao
Jianwei
J
D000465:Algorithms; D000818:Animals; D051379:Mice; D018625:Microscopy, Atomic Force / Q000379:methods; D018144:Rhadinovirus / Q000737:chemistry*; D014771:Virion / Q000737:chemistry*; D014961:X-Ray Diffraction / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*