The advancement and structure of growth steps on thaumatin crystals visualized by atomic force microscopy at molecular resolution

Using in situ atomic force microscopy (AFM) we have recorded the incorporation, on the nanometer scale, of molecules into growth steps of macromolecular crystals grown from solution. From these investigations we were able to deduce the fine structure of the growth step edges and the surface layer of the {101} faces of tetragonal thaumatin crystals. Although the height of the growth step corresponds to unit cells of eight molecules, step...