Film: Diving into the heart of the molecules of life

French version: http://youtu.be/Eyy1y26QH5A

Contact: Claude Sauter

Screenplay: Marie Sissler et Claude Sauter

Achievement: Dominique Sauter

Production: Dominique Sauter et Claude Sauter

“Seeing is believing” could be the motto of the biologist interested in the architecture of macromolecules that make up our cells. However, these nano-objects are too small and cannot be observed directly under the microscope. Therefore, in order to obtain an accurate image at the atomic scale, other approaches such as X-ray crystallography are necessary. This plunge into the heart of living molecules retraces the steps of a crystallographic study leading to the visualization of a biological macromolecule.

The work of researchers in a CNRS laboratory (RNA, IBMC, Strasbourg) is followed step by step from the isolation and purification of a macromolecule from living cells to the establishment of its three-dimensional image, including its crystallization and the analysis of the crystals using synchrotron radiation. This film illustrates little-known aspects of scientists’ daily lives, such as the cloning of molecules, the use of large instruments such as particle accelerators, or 3D visualization.