- Chimera-users - RBVI Mailing Lists

want to converge 20 pdb files of a trimer
by ashok rout 07 Oct '13

07 Oct '13

Hi, I have a nmr structure of a protein which is a trimer. I want to converge 20 pdb files of the trimer, by Chimera. And also want to converge a specific region of the 20 pdb files of the trimer. Can you please assist me how to do this?? Thanks, Ashok -- thanks & regards, Ashok

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Structural Allignment in Chimera
by Syeda Hira Batool 06 Oct '13

06 Oct '13

Hello I want to know how chimera does Structural allignment. I am writing a python script to allign protein structures(from MD simulations) and eventually calculate RMSD. Please can anyone provide me a source code or a helping material.Thanx in advance. Hira Batool Student of BS-Bioinformatics Biosciences Department COMSATS Institute of Information Technology Islamabad, PAKISTAN

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info pivotting on a single atom
by Christian Martinoli 04 Oct '13

04 Oct '13

dear all, I have troubles in setting the center of rotation on a single atom of my model. i'm working with the command line to build up a short clip at the end.what i would need is pivotting the whole model on the three axes, rather than in 2D as seems work with cofr command. any help? Thanks in advance Christian -- Christian Martinoli University Of Pavia Dept. of Biology and Biotechnology "Lazzaro Spallanzani" Structural Biology Lab. Via Ferrata 1, 27100 Pavia Italy

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command line to define a plane
by Jean Didier Pie Marechal 03 Oct '13

03 Oct '13

Dear all, is there a way to define a plane from the command line. Something that would work providing a list of atoms or a selection. Cheers, JD Dr. Jean-Didier Maréchal Associate Professor The Computational Biotechnological Chemistry Team Unitat de Química Física Departament de Química Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona Edifici C.n. 08193 Cerdanyola (Barcelona) Tel: +34.935814936 e-mail: JeanDidier.Marechal(a)uab.es www: http://asklipio.qf.uab.es

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Re: [Chimera-users] Question about multi align viewer
by Elaine Meng 03 Oct '13

03 Oct '13

On Sep 20, 2013, at 9:33 AM, Sean Connell wrote: > Hello I was wondering if it is possible to calculate conservation statistics using only subsets of the aligned sequence. The reason I ask is that in my alignment I have differently families of proteins that have slightly different functions and I would like to highlight residues that are conserved in one subset but not in the other? > Hi Sean, Not directly. I believe you would have to create alignments of just those subsets. You could do that with some other program (including text-editor) before opening the alignment in Chimera, or you could do it in Chimera. Of course, keep the original file with the full alignment too! To edit in Chimera, open the full alignment and then from the sequence window menu choose "Edit... Delete Sequences/Gaps" and in the resulting dialog, choose which sequences to delete. <http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/ContributedSoftware/multalignviewer/f…> <http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/ContributedSoftware/multalignviewer/m…> You can then continue working with the subset alignment in Chimera, including saving it to a new file (sequence window menu "File... Save As"). I hope this helps, Elaine ----- Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D. UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry University of California, San Francisco P.S. your original message was in an attachment, which was kind of weird, but I could view it by just clicking the attachment

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Stereoscope viewing
by Thompson, Matthew K 02 Oct '13

02 Oct '13

Can anyone recommend the best camera settings for stereoscope glasses? Mine just don't seem to turn out right.

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electrostatic surface calculation
by Ursula Schulze-Gahmen 02 Oct '13

02 Oct '13

I calculated the coulombic surface and the electrostatic surface for my molecule. They show a significant difference in the shape of a small surface area. For the electrostatic surface, I converted the pdb file into a pqr file using the pdb2pqr called from chimera. Then I ran APBS also from within Chimera. When I display this surface it exhibits a strong protrusion in an area where there is no side chain. This protrusion is not present in the Coulombic surface. Any idea where this is coming from? Thanks Ursula -- Ursula Schulze-Gahmen, Ph.D. Assistant Researcher UC Berkeley, QB3 356 Stanley Hall #3220 Berkeley, CA 94720-3220

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how to write script that can run chemera command
by 张海平 30 Sep '13

30 Sep '13

Dear professor: I find a command "delete ligand" can delete ligand from a protein. Then I have thousands of protein contain ligands, how can I write a script to do this command automotically, Thanks for your kindly help. Best regard Haiping Zhang

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Editing Question
by Kirk Moldoff 30 Sep '13

30 Sep '13

Hi, I'm working with a pdb model 3ALQ. It is a Tumor Necrosis Factor and its TNFR receptor. I'd like to be able to turn off the bound TNF. Or select it for deletion. Can't figure how to do this. Any suggestions? Ultimately I'd like to be able to save just the TNFR as a .pdb file. Thanks, Kirk -------- Kirk Moldoff www.galeriekirk.com 609-252-9479

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Generating a PDB file
by Nathalia Varejão 27 Sep '13

27 Sep '13

To whom it may concern, I'm using the chimera to visualize a protein ligand docking, but I want to save the best model as a PDB file that I can use anywhere to perform other analysis, is it possible? For example, the pdb that I saved by the chimera do not open in PyMol viewer... Can you help me? Nathalia

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STL file questions
by David Gene Morgan 26 Sep '13

26 Sep '13

Hi, I have a couple of questions about the chimera STL files. I tried to open one using chimera to determine whether they contain any color information, but I wasn't able to open the file I just wrote. I don't care about that, but I would like to know if they contain color information. Is there any way to control the degree of tesselation when writing an STL file? In other words, some STL files are huge because they contain huge numbers of triangles (and some 3d printers can't handle overly large files). I am wondering whether it is possible to control the size of the output files, which is effectively asking if it is possible to control the number of triangles in the file, how finely sampled the model is, etc. (however one wants to describe that property). Finally, as I understand STL files, they are usually "unscaled" (i.e., the co-ordinate system describing the vertices of the triangles doesn't have fixed length units). Is that true for the STL files chimera creates? If I wanted to create two models with an accurate reflection of their relative atomic sizes, are there tricks I will need to employ? -- David Gene Morgan Electron Microscopy Center 320C Simon Hall IU Bloomington 812 856 1457 (office) 812 856 3221 (3200) http://bio.indiana.edu/~cryo

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Calculating SAS areas for selected residues for a whole trajectory of structures
by Harald Lanig 24 Sep '13

24 Sep '13

Dear Chimera users, I am currently using chimera to calculate the solvent accessible surface for several selected residues of a single structure (I am using the Attribute calculator with the formula sum(atom.areaSAS) to do this). Is there a way to apply this to a set of structures coming from a molecular dynamics trajectory? I am interested in how the solvent accessible surface of a set of residues changes during the simulation. Any hint is highly appreciated! Best wishes, -Harald -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ PD Dr. Harald Lanig Universitaet Erlangen/Nuernberg Computer-Chemie-Centrum Naegelsbachstr. 25, D-91052 Erlangen Phone +49(0)9131-85 26525 harald DOT lanig AT fau.de Fax +49(0)9131-85 26565 http://www.chemie.uni-erlangen.de/lanig ------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Building DNA along A PBD Using RNA command
by Joshua Carter 23 Sep '13

23 Sep '13

Hi, I'm working on a project in chimera that involves modeling the binding of a RNA-guided protein complex to a double stranded piece of DNA. What I need to do is be able to is either match a DNA pdb to the existing RNA pdb I have or build one using the rna command in chimera. I know there is a path command, is there any way I could specify that to build along a pdb I have already? Or am I just barking up the wrong tree entirely? Thanks,Josh

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Question about multi align viewer
by Sean Connell 20 Sep '13

20 Sep '13

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selecting a specific residue
by Elaine Meng 19 Sep '13

19 Sep '13

On Sep 18, 2013, at 8:53 PM, Serina Doolittle <serinadoolittle(a)me.com> wrote: > Hi again, > > So now i have another question... > I have selected the ligand because that is what my research mentor and I are interested in (the active site and ligand binding etc.) however, when i select "ligand" it also high lights other molecules around the protein, more around the surface, like butanol - how can i just select the ligand NADPH and not have to select the other small molecule ligands that are not part of the active site of the protein? can i do that? > > Serina Doolittle > Thanks! > Hi Serina, The "ligand" detection uses automatic rules and won't always get what you expect, but there are many other ways to select a specific residue. For example, you can select by residue name and/or number, or with the mouse in the Chimera window. With mouse: Ctrl-click on some atom selects it, and then keyboard up arrow will promote the selection to the whole residue. With command: specify residue name or number, e.g. select :nad select :254.a … would select residue named NAD, or residue 254 in chain A respectively. How do you find out the residue name or number? One way is by hovering the mouse over some atom or bond in the residue, which will pop up a balloon that shows atom name, residue name, and residue number. With menu: Select… Residue… allows selecting by name (all the residue names present will be listed in the menu). NADPH might have residue name NAP, NAD or something like that, since PDB files have 3-letter residue names. That would select all residues of that type, so you'd probably want to use one of the other methods if there are multiple NADPH molecules and you only wanted to select a particular one. Manual pages on selection and command-line atom specification: <http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/selection.html> <http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/midas/frameatom_spec.html> Also, you may want to look through the "getting started" tutorial to become more familiar with Chimera. <http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/Outreach/Tutorials/GettingStarted.html> I hope this helps, Elaine ---------- Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D. UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry University of California, San Francisco

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Hello
by A Amiri 19 Sep '13

19 Sep '13

Hello. I have a problem with chimera! i want to join two pdb file together by C-N peptide bond. Actually this is a modeling of a fusion protein that one part of its, is a protein and another part is a linker. I need a complete structure. I select the carbon atom from one model and nitrogen atom from another model. I use the "build structure<join modesl" menu for this purpose but the "apply" button is inactive still and i don't know how i can activate it! please help me. ________________________________

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Re: [Chimera-users] vop cover
by Elaine Meng 18 Sep '13

18 Sep '13

Hi Pradeep, That message is saying you must specify the density map. I.e. if the atomic structure is model #0 and the density map is model #1, the command could be something like vop cover #1 atom #0 Command usage and options: <http://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimera/docs/UsersGuide/midas/vop.html#cover> Elaine ----- Elaine C. Meng, Ph.D. UCSF Computer Graphics Lab (Chimera team) and Babbitt Lab Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry University of California, San Francisco P.S. it is recommended you send Chimera questions to chimera-users(a)cgl.ucsf.edu instead of to me directly - thanks! On Sep 18, 2013, at 2:02 PM, Pradeep Pallan wrote: > Hi Elaine, > > I was looking at using vop cover. I have a case where part of the molecule > is not within electron density box. The map cuts off at the unit cell dimensions, > and my space group is P1. Where I need edensity is approximately at y= -10. > When I try the command > 'vop cover "atom"', it gives the message "file.pdb is not a volume". > > Is this the right way of getting the molecule covered in e density or do I need > to use a different option. > > Thank you, > PP

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Problem Using Transparency Command in Chimera
by Joshua Carter 18 Sep '13

18 Sep '13

Hi, My name is Josh Carter and I am an undergraduate researcher working at Montana State University. I am using chimera to make a movie a a protein complex interaction and I'm having trouble with the transparency command. When I type in just the command into chimera it doesn't even recognize it as a command. surftransp works but transp or transparency aren't recognized. Is there a bug fix I can run for this? Thanks,Josh

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How to determine the distance from SG of Cys to the centroid of a nearby Trp ring
by Pande, Ajay K 17 Sep '13

17 Sep '13

I am using Tools/Structure Analysis/Axes -Planes-Centroids. Selecting the Trp Indole ring, obtaining the centroid. Then selecting SG of Cys and the centroid and drawing an axis. That axis does not seem to pass (exactly) through the SG and Centroid- that' my first problem, the 2nd problem is to get the distance between the centroid and SG.

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colour by attributes is only colouring one chain of the dimer, how to make the colouring apply to both chains of homodimer
by Anne-Frances Miller 17 Sep '13

17 Sep '13

Dear team Chimers 1- Thank you for GREAT software ! 2- How to make the colouring apply to both chains of homodimer ? I have a homodimer in which features of the active site derive from both monomers so the degree of active site conservation will only show up if I can apply colour by attributes to both monomers (attribute will be conservation) Right now, colour by attributes is only colouring one chain of the dimer, chain A. Anne-Frances Anne-Frances Miller Professor of Chemistry Director, Magnetic Resonance Centre University of Kentucky Dept. Chemistry, 505 Rose Street Lexington KY 40506-0055

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Chimera Questions
by Serina Doolittle 16 Sep '13

16 Sep '13

Hi, My name is Serina Doolittle. I am an undergraduate research student at Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah, Ga. I am currently using Chimera to build two protein models. I have the proteins in the form that I want them in to 3D print. However, one of them is not a single chain protein. It has chain A and B. I hid chain B and focused on chain A because of the simplicity for the 3D protein model that I want. However, when you hide chain B and you put chain A on "show surface" that are like little holes or blotches missing from the protein where chain B is suppose to be. Is there anyway that I can fix this problem and single out chain A to make it look like it is completely lone in the "show surface" view. If you would like I will send you the Chimera file ("session"). That way you can visualize what I am trying to do. Serina Doolittle serinadoolittle(a)me.com 912-665-3259 Armstrong Atlantic State University Student

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How to move a domain in mouse mode /move selection
by Juergen Joachim Mueller 12 Sep '13

12 Sep '13

Hallo, how can I move a domain consisting of 3 chains using mouse mode/ move selection? I will use chain A: 6-121, chainB: 7-103, Chain C: 6-103. The selection by command line takes always the longest number 121 for all three chains - A:6-121, B:7-121, C:6-121. Greetings, Jürgen (Chimera production version 1.8 (build 38824) Windows8)

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How to modify a structure to put some atoms in a plane....
by Sergio Garay 12 Sep '13

12 Sep '13

Hi all I'm trying to put a Nitrogen atoms of a Nitro group in the same plane that a imidazol ring, but until now with no success. I've tried using modify structure and changing the bond and geometry of the carbon to which the Nitrogen is joined, but it did not work. I attached an image with the problem. I've also tried to minimize the structure using AMBER ff (despite I know that this ff is not appropriate for small organic molecules) but it can fix the problem. May be I'm not clear enough so, I summarize: I want to put the Nitro group in the same plane of a imidazol ring (look at the picture, please). Any advice will be appreciated. [image: Inline image 1] Sergio -- Sergio Garay Dr. en Ciencias Biológicas Facultad de Bioquimica y Cs. Biológicas Universidad Nacional del Litoral Santa Fe - Argentina C.C. 242 - Ciudad Universitaria - C.P. S3000ZAA Argentina Ph. +54 (342) 4575-213 Fax. +54 (342) 4575-221

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Solvent Channel Dimensions
by Thompson, Matthew K 12 Sep '13

12 Sep '13

How can I measure the dimensions of a solvent channel in a protein? The channel is clearly visible after the surface in generated. In addition, the cavity can be created with Surfnet. Something like "Measure and Color Blobs" does not give the dimensions I need. I am interested in the width of the channel at its most narrow point. Thanks Matt

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Re: [Chimera-users] automatically calculated labels for quantitative tomography data
by Tom Goddard 11 Sep '13

11 Sep '13

Hi Martin, Thanks for the detailed explanation. I think a generalization of your idea might be useful to more people. Basically you could create a text label including an automatically updated numeric value, but that number could be calculated from a density map contour level, or a molecular dynamics trajectory energy value, or a distance between a residue and ligand during a conformational change -- in other words the numerical value could measure many things. The case of just density map threshold levels has some utility, but since the same value can be seen in the volume dialog where you actually change the value, it seems more for presentation than analysis. The general tool would take significant work, because Chimera doesn't have a framework for providing measurement updates. We are working on the next generation of Chimera and this graphical label idea is interesting because we are looking at having fewer dialogs -- even a Chimera in a web browser. Maybe instead of using a separate volume dialog you could just display the threshold levels like you have done, and simply use the mouse to directly change those values in the graphics window. You've mentioned movie making. The labeling in your figure can be included in Chimera movies now, and the values can change, and labels fade in and out. Most Chimera movies are made with command scripts and these label operations would use the 2dlabels command. Granted with your proposed tool it might be easier to make the movie, but I'd say only slightly easier, because the overall movie making is not simple and the labels are just one small aspect. I have worked with Carolyn Larabell's group looking at their x-ray tomography data using Chimera some years back. They concluded Amira better suited their needs for doing segmentation. Here is a demo I gave showing what Chimera could do with their Pombe cell tomography. http://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/chimera/data/ncxt-feb2008/xraytomography.html Tom On Sep 11, 2013, at 5:05 PM, Martin de Jonge wrote: > Hi Tom, > > Thanks for the reply. I guess you raise a few questions, so I'll try and pick them individually. > > 1. the concept > >>> Or maybe it doesn't need a separate window -- you might just be able to say display colored labels in the graphics (e.g. "Zn 11" "Cu 47" "Ca 1500") for several density maps that list both an element name and the current contour level. You could control those levels using the Volume Viewer dialog and the labels would automatically update. > > Yes, I think that's what I was thinking. In the image I linked you to earlier, the threshold levels were manually entered into the color key. Every time the threshold changed these entries had to be updated also. In the new implementation one might enter into the color key dialog: "Ca {#3 * 1000}", where "#3" represents the threshold level for model number 3, the " * 1000" indicates multiplication by 1000, and the curly brackets indicate the presence of a substitutional expression. (Of course you would want to make this syntax consistent with Chimera!) > > The thinking about the simple mathematical operations is that sometimes the reconstructed data is only relatively scaled, and needs a final conversion factor to become a 'real' unit. Alternately, one might have data in ng/µm^3 and wish to convert to ug/cm^3, in which case multiplication by some power of 10 would be nice. In other cases the mathematical function could enable a change from units of mass/volume to molarity. Don't worry too much about this idea - it is probably not worth the effort, and can probably be performed by other means. > > 2. the user base > > I agree that at present there is not much call for this feature, however I note that two forms of x-ray tomography have recently entered the quantitative domain: x-ray fluorescence tomography (now performed by 10+ groups around the world) and soft-x-ray absorption tomography, performed most notably by the group of Larabell and LeGros at the UCSF (see eg http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21360734) (have you made contact with that group? I /think/ they render with Amira, but they are putting heaps of computing effort into automated segmentation of their LAC data, and I imagine this could be a good team to collaborate / share resources with). But I appreciate that the tomography user base would not rise to 1000 within 5 years, and therefore that this extension may not be practicable. > > I think this feature would be useful for the other main Chimera user base, which I gather is the protein crystallography (PX) / molecular modelling / imaging people. I guess my thinking here is that one of the great features of Chimera is the ability to explore the dataset dynamically, by adjusting thresholds, rotating, etc. This applies also for molecular / PX data. For all cases it is useful to adjust the threshold (being now generalised to either linear absorption coefficient (LAC), elemental concentration, or electron density) to see different features. This is usually done with the slider, or from the cmd line, but can also be scripted in movies etc. My suggestion (that I think you have understood in general, but repeat for clarity) is that there could be a mechanism to display the present threshold in a key on the display window. As such it could be one (electron density, LAC) or several (elemental concentration) numbers that are transferred into the key. > > Why am I saying this? Just in case you think there might be some other call for this feature from the other user base! I leave it to you to decide, and fully accept your knowledge of the Chimera user base! > > Thanks for the response, and for developing a great piece of software. Let me know if there is anything I can do in return (besides acknowledgement / citation!). > > [PS - I took the chimera-users off the response just in case you think the Larabell comments are politically sensitive. I don't mind if they go out - I stand by my words - I'll leave it to you to decide, and to forward the mail to the development team as you see fit.] > > Yours, > > Martin de Jonge > > > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Tom Goddard [mailto:goddard@sonic.net] > Sent: Thursday, 12 September 2013 8:16 AM > To: Martin de Jonge > Cc: chimera-users(a)cgl.ucsf.edu > Subject: Re: [Chimera-users] automatically calculated labels for quantitative tomography data > > Hi Martin, > > Your elemental abundance tomography is interesting. I'm not sure I understand your Chimera suggestion. Do you mean there would be a separate window that lists the threshold levels for Zn, Cu, Fe, Mn density maps in type-in fields and adjusting the values would both change the contour level (as is done by the Volume Viewer tool) and update the labels displayed in the graphics window (as with the 2D Label tool)? Or maybe it doesn't need a separate window -- you might just be able to say display colored labels in the graphics (e.g. "Zn 11" "Cu 47" "Ca 1500") for several density maps that list both an element name and the current contour level. You could control those levels using the Volume Viewer dialog and the labels would automatically update. (By the way, did you know you can display 6 or 10 histograms in the Volume Viewer dialog instead of the normal limit of 3? Use volume dialog menu Features / Data Display Options and change "Maximum number of Histograms.", and use Features / Save Default Dialog Settings if you want that to be the default for future Chimera uses.) I don't understand what you mean by "include simple mathematical operations". > > If I understand your basic idea, I think it is specialized enough that only a few Chimera users would use it. I'm not sure I've ever seen a figure like yours with values that correspond directly to density map levels, because usually the density map values have some meaningless normalization. Most often presentation figure keys need to be created in an entirely custom way appropriate to the content of the figure. Still I think the feature you suggest would be cool, but given the hundreds of improvements people have requested we try to work on ones that lots of Chimera users (500 or 1000) will benefit from, or requests that allow you to do something that isn't otherwise possible. > > Tom > > > On Sep 10, 2013, at 7:56 PM, Martin de Jonge wrote: > >> Hi all, >> >> this might sound like a strange feature, but I use Chimera to render quantitative tomography data. I typically render somewhere between 2 and 6 separate elements (i.e., Zn, Cu, Fe, Mn, etc) and present these with a colour key, along with a numerical value to indicate the threshold concentration (typically in mmol or similar unit). There is an example of such data in: http://www.pnas.org/content/107/36/15676/F1.expansion.html >> >> When exploring such data it is very useful to adjust the display threshold, as various anatomical features appear at very different concentration levels. My suggestion / request is to have a numerical field in the colour key that can be linked to (eg) the per-model thresholds to indicate the concentration threshold at that moment. This would be particularly useful for making movies for presentations and articles. >> >> Some thoughts on useful properties of this numerical field: >> >> - it should inherit the colour of the colour-key label that it is associated with (or be able to select to be inheritable) >> - it could include simple mathematical operations, for when there is a simple relationship between the data and the reportable concentration eg, *, /, +, - >> - one should be able to specify the format of the number (using the usual formatting codes). >> >> thanks >> >> Martin de Jonge >> _______________________________________________ >> Chimera-users mailing list >> Chimera-users(a)cgl.ucsf.edu >> http://plato.cgl.ucsf.edu/mailman/listinfo/chimera-users >> > >

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