Membrane proteins are crucial components of cellular membranes and are responsible for a variety of physiological functions. The advent of new tools and technologies for structural biology of membrane proteins has led to a significant increase in the number of structures deposited to the Protein Data Bank during the past decade. This new knowledge has expanded our fundamental understanding of their mechanism of function and contributed to the drug-design efforts. In this chapter we discuss current approaches for membrane protein expression, solubilization, crystallization, and data collection. Additionally, we describe the protein quality-control assays that are often instrumental as a guideline for a shorter path toward the structure.
Keywords: Amphipol; Bicelle; Crystallization; Detergent; Expression; FRAP; HiLiDe; In meso; In surfo; Lipidic cubic phase; Lipidic sponge phase; Membrane protein; Nanodisc; Thermal shift assay.