 | |||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 | |||
| |||
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||
|
Wide open
In developing their models, the team at NCMI is also improving the field's software infrastructure. EMAN—short for Electron Micrograph Analysis—automates most of the reconstruction process, from selecting the particles to refining the three-dimensional models. The software package allows researchers to produce in 24 hours models that once would have taken a month's work. "As a national center, we get lots of projects to work on. With existing software packages, we just couldn't get the number of projects we're working on done," says Ludtke, who developed EMAN along with the center's Philip Baldwin. The first version of EMAN was released in the summer of 1999, and a new version was released in early 2000. It is provided free of charge and with open source code so that researchers around the world can use this rapidly expanding technique. At least eight research groups outside of the center are actively using the package, and there have been many more downloads. | ||
 Screen shot of the EMAN software package. EMAN is already allowing researchers to perform particle reconstructions in 24 hours that formerly required a month of user-intensive work. |
|
| |
|
"The open-source choice was primarily a philosophical one for us. The software should be in the public domain," Ludtke says. "There are a lot of labs around the country which have electron microscopes and can collect particle image data. But the steep learning curve and monetary expense have always been barriers to these groups doing reconstructions. We wanted to eliminate both of these barriers and get more people involved in this technique." This research is funded by the National Center for Research Resources of the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation. 
| ||
|
 |
 |
 |
 |