Overview

IMCA, established in 1990, is the association of pharmaceutical companies committed to the use of macromolecular crystallography as a tool in drug discovery and product development. Through a managing contract with Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute, IMCA supports the IMCA-CAT facility at sector 17 of the Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory. The IMCA member companies are: AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Merck, Novartis, and Pfizer.

IMCA-CAT is a structural biology research facility for pharmaceutical drug discovery programs. It was established in 1992 to design, build, and operate a research facility at the Advanced Photon Source, a high energy synchrotron X-ray source at Argonne National Laboratory. Today, IMCA-CAT operates a state-of-the-art insertion device beamline for confidential and proprietary macromolecular crystallography experiments. To meet the demands of the pharmaceutical industry, IMCA-CAT is optimized for high-throughput data acquisition, is committed to generating the highest quality X-ray diffraction data, provides reliable access for proprietary research, ensures maximum efficiency, and invests in the facility to remain at the technical forefront for pharmaceutical research in structural biology.

Access to the IMCA-CAT facility is available to all researchers in structural biology to collect X-ray diffraction data on macromolecules.

Pharmaceutical member companies of IMCA are scheduled for weekly proprietary data collection throughout each operating cycle.

Non-member companies are invited to collect proprietary data at the beamline via the IMCA-CAT Subscription Program. Annual subscriptions for beam time ensure guaranteed, frequent, and rapid access.

Academic researchers are invited to conduct non-proprietary experiments at the beamline via the APS User Program.

Discovery and lead optimization phases of drug development are accelerated with high-throughput data acquisition at IMCA-CAT. Automated sample mounting, diffraction restoring for high-precision sample centering, and shutterless continuous-rotation data collection distinguish IMCA-CAT as an outstanding research environment for confidential and proprietary structural biology programs in the pharmaceutical industry.

Structural studies of the most challenging complexes, including membrane proteins, small crystals, and radiation-sensitive samples, benefit from advanced beamline capabilities. Fragment screening high-throughput demands are met with fully automated and fast processes for data acquisition. On-the-fly structural analyses are enabled by high-speed, secure, and encrypted data transfer to off-site locations for integrating with company-based pipelines.

The IMCA-CAT facility is a state-of-the-art facility for proprietary drug discovery research. Intense focused beam, robotics for sample mounting, diffraction rastering and high-speed precision sample positioning, and shutterless continuous-rotation data collection enable the beamline to meet the throughput demands of the pharmaceutical industry. Experiment design capabilities include wavelength tunability for MAD and SAD experiments, selectable mini beam for optimum beam size, and collect-along-a-vector for overcoming sample degradation. Guaranteed, frequent, and routine access for proprietary data acquisition, whether on-site, remotely, or via mail-in, smoothly integrates with pharmaceutical drug design work flows.

Collect data on-site or remotely from your home laboratory, or utilize mail-in service. Pharmaceutical companies interested in conducting proprietary experiments are invited to inquire about the IMCA-CAT Subscription Program. General users interested in conducting non-proprietary experiments should apply via the APS User Program.