The Chemical Heritage Museum in Philadelphia also has some exhibits of electron cloud models from the same time period, similar to the penicillin model in this article.
> For over a decade X-ray crystallographer Roget Burnett toted around the world the bits and pieces of his project of determining the structure of an adenovirus coat protein. He crystallized his protein while a postdoc at the University of Michigan. In 1973 he carried these tiny crystals in capillary tubes to the University of Basel. For the next seven years he and his associates made hundreds of X-ray photographs of crystals. These photographs were transformed (several steps later) into unwieldy plastic sheets showing electron densities at cross-sections of the protein. In 1980 Burnett transported these sheets to Columbia University, where his team examined them to precisely locate the protein's atoms. In 1984 they turned to early computer graphics to model the molecule. Today computers expedite nearly all these steps.
I really like the method of visualizing the electron cloud by printing out many transparent plastic sheets and then stacking them; it's looks very stylish!
Some photos here: http://imgur.com/a/xcJxn
Their caption says,
> For over a decade X-ray crystallographer Roget Burnett toted around the world the bits and pieces of his project of determining the structure of an adenovirus coat protein. He crystallized his protein while a postdoc at the University of Michigan. In 1973 he carried these tiny crystals in capillary tubes to the University of Basel. For the next seven years he and his associates made hundreds of X-ray photographs of crystals. These photographs were transformed (several steps later) into unwieldy plastic sheets showing electron densities at cross-sections of the protein. In 1980 Burnett transported these sheets to Columbia University, where his team examined them to precisely locate the protein's atoms. In 1984 they turned to early computer graphics to model the molecule. Today computers expedite nearly all these steps.
I really like the method of visualizing the electron cloud by printing out many transparent plastic sheets and then stacking them; it's looks very stylish!