A review paper analyzing the latest research trends in continuous femtosecond crystallography experimental techniques for compound mixing has been published in Journal Citation Reports (JCR), the world's top international journal for analytical chemistry.

The paper comprehensively analyzes the latest research techniques for observing the crystal structure of proteins and compounds by time-resolving the reaction process. The research paper (English title: Recent chemical mixing devices for time-resolved serial femtosecond crystallography, co-corresponding author: Dr. Jaehyun Park, Pohang Accelerator Research Institute) was first published on January 26 in the online version of TrAC Trends in Analytical Chemistry (IF=13.1), which is ranked in the top 0.6% of journals in the field, and will be published in the March 2024 issue.

The study of protein structure is crucial to understanding biological phenomena at the atomic level and is widely applied in drug discovery and the pharmaceutical industry. It also provides structural information for protein engineering to improve the efficiency of enzymes, which have applications in a variety of industries.
 Serial crystallography techniques using X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) or radiated X-rays are considered to be the state-of-the-art technology for protein structure elucidation at biologically relevant temperature environments with minimal sample damage from radiation, and provide more accurate structural information compared to the more common X-ray crystallography or cryo-EM experimental techniques.

Continuous crystallography is a field specialized in the study of molecular activity using pump-probe or compound mixing techniques with optical lasers, which allows for the time-resolved study of molecular processes. Among them, the time-resolved continuous crystallography technique using optical lasers is well established, but the kinetic study of proteins in response to ligands (or inhibitors) is still in the development stage worldwide and is currently being actively researched in XFEL-based research centers overseas. In this paper, Prof. Kihyun Nam introduced the development principles, possibilities, limitations, and factors that should be considered in the use of the system, as well as the mixing devices for time-resolved studies developed overseas and the BITS (combination of Inject-and-Transfer System) based mixing devices developed in-house. He also provided an in-depth outlook on future research directions in this field.