Illuminating Atoms: Science Meets Art

Pharmorphix, Cambridge: The rapid crystallisation of the proprietary cancer drug shown here mimics the metamorphosis from the early years of cancer treatment to the groundbreaking, life-saving drugs available today.
Pharmorphix focuses on understanding, enhancing, and optimizing the physical properties of active drug substances and the final drug product to deliver safe and effective medicines.

Max Alexander

From crystals of cancer drugs to atomic patterns drawn in the sand, a new photography exhibition at the Royal Albert hall perfectly captures the beauty and intricacy inherent in the science of crystallography.

Illuminating Atoms, by the photographer Max Alexander, depicts a series of documentary images of crystallography experiments in action, alongside portraits of modern day crystallographers. The exhibition, which is sponsored by the Science & Technology Facilities Council (STFC), the Wellcome Trust, GSK, AstraZeneca, Pharmorphix and Diamond Light Source, conveys the untold story of crystallography, demonstrating the range of science taking place and the rich and vibrant community working in this field.

David Stuart is a biologist who studies viruses; how they infect, spread, and evolve, and how they can be treated with targeted medicines. He is holding a sculpture of the hand, foot and mouth virus, a childhood disease that infects 1.6 million people each year. David solved the structure of the virus at Diamond Light Source and has since created a potential cure for this currently untreatable disease. His work may also lead to new treatments for other diseases, such as polio.

Max Alexander/Diamond Light Source

Since its inception, over 100 years ago, crystallography has had an illustrious history, having supported the discovery of antibiotics, penicillin, and the double helix in DNA. The technique is still used today to study a vast range of matter, including viruses like HIV, treatments for cancer, advanced nanotech materials, and innovative green energy solutions.

The exhibition, which features scientists and experiments from academia and industry, is made up of 37 photographs, depicting both the science and the people on the front line. Illuminating Atoms builds on some of the key tropes of crystallography – the diffraction pattern, Bragg’s law, atomic structure – to demonstrate the rich complexity of the field. David Keen, ISIS physicist and President of the British Crystallographic Association, was pictured on a beach next to a diffraction pattern drawn into the sand.

David Keen studies crystal structures that behave in unusual ways when their atoms become disordered; they might unexpectedly melt, change into a glass, or start conducting electricity. Hundreds of holes were dug in the sand in Porthcawl beach in South Wales to portray the neutron diffraction pattern from a quartz crystal. Quartz is one of the minerals David has studied and is a common component of sand.

Max Alexander

David reveals the behind the scenes work that went into creating the pictures: "I can tell you that making 641 precisely arranged holes in the sand is pretty hard work! But I enjoyed the idea that the neutron diffraction pattern we were drawing was from a quartz crystal, the key compound in sand. The picture is very thought-provoking in that way."

Anna Warren works as a protein crystallographer at Diamond Light Source. She uses a high-intensity X-ray beam to probe tiny crystals, from which she can deduce the structure of the crystals at the molecular level. The high-intensity X-rays are very damaging to the crystals, so Anna has to work quickly, probing each crystal for just a few seconds. The intricate diagrams Anna has drawn on the mirror are a short-hand way to describe how symmetry (reflections, rotations, etc.) dictates how atoms and molecules pack in crystals.

Max Alexander/Diamond Light Source

The exhibition is unique in its depiction of a broad range of scientists and experiments; that’s because, for Max, the exhibition was about telling the untold story of crystallography: “My mission was essentially to connect the public to this astonishing scientific technique. Crystallography has been hugely significant throughout the 20^th Century, and crystallographers continue to make a real contribution to society through their work. It’s something I wanted people to know about, and I’ve endeavoured to tell that story in a beautiful and engaging way.”

Diamond Light Source is the UK’s synchrotron science facility, producing light 10 billion times brighter than the Sun. Each year, more than 3000 scientists visit Diamond to use the beams for experiments, and many of these researchers are crystallographers. Solving the structure of insulin took Dorothy Hodgkin 30 years, but with Diamond it could have been done in an hour.

Max Alexander/Diamond Light Source

Crystallography has been deeply significant to the history of science, but it’s also made its mark on social history. The story of crystallography boasts some high profile female figures, including Kathleen Lonsdale, Helen Megaw, Rosalind Franklin, and Nobel Prize winners Dorothy Hodgkin and Ada E. Yonath. Featuring women from all fields using crystallography, Max’s photographs convey the vital role women continue to play in the field.

The exhibition sends the message loud and clear: crystallography is as exciting as it is beautiful. Max’s images of vast scientific facilities juxtaposed with minute crystal structures demonstrate the intricacy of crystallography; whilst his portraits illustrate the gamut of personalities that work in the field. Pairing visual splendour with the human story, Illuminating Atoms creates a powerful picture of this hugely significant scientific technique.