Science | Jose Brandao-Neto

Jose Brandao-Neto
Macromolecular Crystallography

Jose Brandao-Neto Jose Brandao is the beamline scientist leading the construction of I04.1, the macromolecular crystallography side station. He was in the Protein Structure Group at Astex Therapeutics in Cambridge, UK, and prior to that he was beamline scientist at the Protein Crystallography beamline at the Brazilian National Synchrotron Laboratory.

Email: Jose Brandao-Neto
Tel: +44 (0) 1235 778506
Beamline I04.1: Fixed wavelength MX station

Key Research Interests

Methods in Macromolecular Crystallography, protein crystallography, macromolecules,  x-ray instrumentation

Current Research Interests

The year 1 MX beamlines I02, I03 and I04 will be fully tuneable for multi-wavelength anomalous dispersion measurements. I04.1 will be a fixed wavelength side-station. The beamline will be used for ligand binding studies with macromolecules whose structures are known and macromolecular structure determination when it is expected that the structure can be solved by molecular replacement.

Careful consideration has been given for the geometry of the beamline, in which an X-ray beam originates from a canted undulator on the same straight as the undulator for beamline I04. A wavelength of 0.916 Å has been selected which will allow for measurements of anomalous scattering arising from bromine, selenium and other elements. Thus the beamline can also be used for ab initio structure determination. The MX beamlines will be well adapted for high throughput data collection as demanded by our users, especially by industrial users and those from structural genomics consortia.

The main focus of my research interests are in methods for improving the throughput while keeping the same data quality level, optimising the usage of the hardware and developing standards for quantitative assessment of diffraction from protein crystals.

Selected Publications

  1. "Characterization of wax as a potential diffraction intensity standard for macromolecular crystallography beamlines", Brandao-Neto J, Thompson SP, Lennie AR, Ferreira FF, Tang CC. J Synchrotron Radiat. 2010 Jan;17(Pt 1):53-60. Epub 2009 Nov 14.
  2. "Crystallization and preliminary X-ray crystallographic analysis of the heterodimeric crotoxin complex and the isolated subunits crotapotin and phospholipase A2 SO", K. F. Santos, M. T. Murakami, A. C. O. Cintra, M. H. Toyama, S. Marangoni, V. P. Forrer, J. R. Brandao Neto, I. Polikarpov and R. K. Arni, Acta Crystallographica Section F 2007;63(4):287-290
  3. Conference Presentation: "Machine Assignment Analysis Using an Ant Colony Algorithm", Brandao-Neto, J.R., Combinatorial Optimisation 2004, Lancaster, UK (2004).
  4. "Crystal Structure of a-Galactosidase from Trichoderma reesei and Its Complex with Galactose: Implications for Catalytic Mechanism", Golubev, A. M., Nagem, R. A. P., Brandão Neto, J. R., Neustroev, K. N., Eneyskaya, E. V., Kulminskaya, A. A., Shabalin, K. A., Savel'ev, A. N. and Polikarpov, I., J. Mol. Biol., 339(2), 413 (2004).
  5. "X-Ray Absorption in 2D Protein Crystals", Brandao-Neto, J.R., CCP4 Newsletter, 40, art.16 (March 2002).
  6. "Purification, crystallization and preliminary diffraction study of b-galactosidase from Penicillium sp.", Neustroev, K N; Sousa, E A de; Golubev, A M; Neto, J R Brandao; Eneyskaya, E V; Kulminskaya, A A; Polikarpov, I, Acta Crystallographica. Section D, Biological Crystallography, 56 (11) (2000)
  7. "Self-Tuning Control for Rotating Systems Subject to Torque Load Variations", Brandão-Neto, J.R., MPhil Dissertation, Campinas, Brazil (1999).