Department of Chemistry
The University of Arizona

Authored By: Abby L. Parrill and Jacquelyn Gervay
Funded by NSF

(Revised by W. R. Salzman, 11 Oct 96)

Molecule Viewing Information

To View Molecules, Follow the Following Steps

  1. Obtain a helper application which can view pdb (Protein Databank) format molecules
    2. For viewing on Macintosh
    Obtain RasMac by anonymous ftp at ftp.dcs.ed.ac.uk/pub/rasmol. Use BinHex 4.0 or StuffIt Expander to convert the file and decompress it.
    For viewing on a PC using any of the Windows operating systems
    Obtain RasWin by anonymous ftp at ftp.dcs.ed.ac.uk/pub/rasmol and unzip the file.
    If you have difficulty obtaining RasWin from this site you can obtain the self-extracting file cpraswin.exe here. Just place this file in its own folder (directory) and type the file name "cpraswin".
  2. Make sure your web browser has a chemical/x-pdb mime type
    3. For Netscape
    Under the "Options" menu, select "Preferences". Use the menu bar in the top of the window which opens to select "Helper Applications:. Scroll through the list which comes up to see if there is a chemical/x-pdb mime type listed. If there is not, click on "New...". Enter chemical for the mime type, x-pdb as the mime subtype and click "OK".
  3. Configure your browser to launch your helper application
    4. For Netscape
    Select "Launch Application" for the action and click "Browse...". Provide the path to your copy of RasMac or RasWin and click "OK".

UC Berkeley Version of RasMol

There is a revised version of RasMol, for Mac's and PC's , at the University of California, Berkeley RasMol site. This version has a few more features, including viewing several molecules at the same time. (The PC version of this program has a menu option for stereoscopic viewing, but it doesn't appear to work.)

Chime, the Plugin Version

There is a plugin version of Rasmol, called "Chime," which is available if your web browser supports plugins and if you prefer to use the program in that way. Chime, for the Mac, and both 16 bit and 32 bit PC versions (along with instructions on how to install them), are available at Chemscape. Warning: One of us (WRS) found the 16 bit PC version to be "buggy."

Stereoscopic View of Molecules

The University of Massacheussets RasMol website has a beta version of Raswin 2.6 which provides for a stereoscopic view of molecules and crystals. The PC version requires the capability of running 32-bit software (Windiws 95 or Windows NT). There are instructions on how to run the software on PC's running Windows 3.1 and Windows for Workgroups. The file you are looking for is 32-bit Raswin 2.6-beta-2. If you want to look at all the stuff at the UMass RasMol site the address is www.umass.edu/microbio/rasmol/.

Abby Parrill, Dr. Jacquelyn Gervay, and Dr. W. R. Salzman
The Department of Chemistry
The University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721

Please contact Dr. Salzman at salzman@arizona.edu with problems and comments.