Hi Tom, I have a non-EM density question! Is there a way to display the buried surface between two PDB chains in Chimera? Something like what GRASP does: http://www.csb.yale.edu/poststructure/grasp/grasp2.html
I know I can measure the area with: "measure buriedArea :.A :.B" but is there a way to display the buried surfaces? Thanks! -gabe
Hi Gabe, The measure buriedArea command sets a value for each atom giving the area buried (square Angstroms). So you can use measure buriedArea :.A :.B surfcat a :.A surfcat b :.B color pink :.A color lightblue :.B surface @/buriedSESArea>1 The surfcat command just defines chains A and B as two different objects for surfacing and the surface command show the surface patches associated with all atoms having buried solvent excluded surface area greater than 1 square Angstrom. It shows the entire patch of area for those atoms, not just the part that is buried. So it is pretty ugly and a bigger surface then just the buried part. For a much prettier picture but a slightly different measurement you might try instead split #0 surface measure contactArea #0.1 #0.2 2 slab 0.5 The split puts chains A and B in two models #0.1 and #0.2. The "surface" makes surfaces on each. And the "measure contactArea..." finds all points on one surface within 2 Angstroms of any point on the other surface and displays a pretty looking slab depicting the surface (attached picture). This is a different definition of buried area but might do. http://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/chimera/current/docs/UsersGuide/midas/measure.html#c... Tom
