Determine the contribution of radiation damage at higher resolutions

Determine whether radiation damage contributes to the phase-retrieval transfer function at resolutions higher than those achieved in the reported single-protein XFEL imaging experiment.

Background

The study uses hybrid plasma–molecular-dynamics simulations to evaluate how ionization and atomic displacement during a 25-fs XFEL pulse affect diffraction from the erythrocruorin complex. The simulations indicate that damage begins to affect the scattering measure at resolutions above approximately 4 nm and becomes increasingly severe beyond 1 nm.

The experimentally obtained phase-retrieval transfer function declines primarily within the resolution range analyzed in the paper, but the authors cannot exclude an additional radiation-damage contribution at higher resolutions. Establishing the magnitude of this contribution is important for interpreting future improvements toward substantially higher-resolution, potentially atomic-scale single-protein XFEL imaging.