Are there any plans for CryoSPARC to support estimation and/or correction of beam tilt? This would be very helpful for datasets collected with image shift (or an imperfectly aligned scope).
Currently cryoSPARC seems to read _rlnBeamTilt values when importing a star file, but does not seem to use them in any corrections as far as I can tell.
I’d just like to echo Oli’s message and say that this would be quite helpful. For data with no beam tilt, it’s great to process in multiple programs, and cryoSPARC works amazingly well! However, any significant beam tilt and then I’m siloed into Relion because beam tilt correction gives such a boost in resolution.
We have been working hard on a completely rewritten cryosparc core computation module - mainly to deal with various signal processing issues, GPU memory requirements, inefficiencies, and expanding support for more advanced uses. Complex-valued CTFs (i.e. as caused by beam tilt) are supported by the new core, so we will soon be rolling this out! Our beam-tilt estimation tools need some work but correction at least should be possible very soon.
Can’t answer for @RickBaker, but in one recent case (data collected using extended image shift up to 3mrad, beam tilts refined in clusters based on image shift) grouped beam tilt refinement improved resolution from 3.5 to 2.9. In another case, from 2.7 to 2.5. Really depends on data collection strategy and microscope alignment
Thanks, I was just looking to confirm my expectation that there is no point in employing beam tilt refinement at resolutions lower than ~4.5 - 6 A, as shown in Anchi’s paper. (And, according to my understanding, that was without tilt compensation).
Ah - I haven’t tried with data that low res. In the 3.5Å before, 2.9Å after case it is possible that the corner holes may have been limited to sub-4 without beam tilt correction (these had ~3mrad beam tilt), but I haven’t refined using only particles from those mics so I can’t be sure.
Have you tested any of these sets in cryoSPARC 2.8 yet? I’m hoping correction for beam tilt has been incorporated but haven’t had free GPU time to test yet
In my case, parallel beam, microprobe (0.6/1 gold grids, one shot per hole), beam tilt compensation was on but ineffective (calibration issue), so the refined beam tilts were similar to what one would expect for no compensation (~0.2mrad/um shift)