Then in 1990, after 15 years» work refining sample preparation and electron detection, Henderson succeeded in using an electron microscope to create an image of a large bacterial cell membrane protein
called bacteriorhodopsin, and do it at atomic resolution.
When forming this model, the Bochum researchers benefitted from their comprehensive experience that they had gained resolving the mechanism of light - driven proton
pump bacteriorhodopsin in detail.
Henderson set the groundwork for cryo - EM in 1975, when he used electron microscopy to determine a three - dimensional model of
bacteriorhodopsin by averaging multiple images obtained with weak electron beams.
Bacteriorhodopsin, as it was called, responded to green light, and scientists have since found it in microbes living in saltwater all over the world.
Indeed, by combining opsins, including ChR2, which turns cells on, and halorhodopsin and
bacteriorhodopsin, which turn cells off, Deisseroth can ask ever more nuanced questions about complex diseases: Epilepsy, autism, sleep disorders, and schizophrenia may all require this combination approach.
It's one of the world's most studied molecules:
bacteriorhodopsin, a protein that pumps protons out of a bacterium.
In 1990, Henderson was able to obtain the first atomic - resolution cryo - EM structure — of
bacteriorhodopsin, which has a well - ordered structure that made high resolution easier to achieve than would have been the case with many other biomolecules.