What does the "B Factor " mean?

I’m surprised no one has commented on the resolution.

B-factor estimation is flaky at best (and outright dangerous at worst) at resolutions worse than about 5A.

With a 7.x A map, I would not trust any b-factor estimate - RELION has the same issue, albeit less severely*. Right now I have a 9A map and both CryoSPARC and RELION are estimating b-factors in the (-)400-900 range. I do block-based reconstruction in RELION, hit 5A, b-factor estimate immediately drops to a much saner (-)160… which I still think is too high.

When checking model “sanity” during refinement, I check the sharpened map but rarely worry about it too much in CryoSPARC as it always seems over sharpened. I’m more concerned the unsharpened map is in line with what I would expect for a reported resolution.

*The difference in how CryoSPARC and RELION handle b-factor has been discussed in the past. :slight_smile:

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