Investigating vault particles with Claude

Anthropic's biology research lab reports the first 3D structure of a vault particle from a prokaryotic cell—a bacteriophage-derived vault built from 96 copies of a single protein, L05, solved by cryo-EM. Under researchers' direction, Claude searched protein databases, designed DNA constructs, optimized a size-exclusion chromatography isolation method that cut purification from about three days to roughly 90 minutes, and processed microscopy data, yielding a first structural model in 34 hours. The team also engineered altered and enlarged vault variants, and notes the work demonstrates using Claude across every step of fundamental biology research.