| abstract |
The invention relates to a method for crystallizing a substance dissolved in a solvent, comprising the following steps: introducing a solvent volume containing the substance into a chamber having a preset temperature, humidity, and gas composition, adding a predetermined volume of a precipitate to the solvent volume containing the substance, allowing the solvent to evaporate while simultaneously observing structural changes in the solvent volume containing the substance and the precipitate by means of dynamic light scattering, detecting weight changes and determining the molarities, making an association with the location in the phase diagram on the basis of the DLS measurement and the results of the molarity determination, allowing a predetermined number of crystal nuclei to form by adding solvent or adding precipitate, putting the solvent volume containing the substance and the precipitate into a metastable state by adding solvent and/or protein solution or by allowing the concentration of the dissolved substance to decrease by allowing nucleation cores to form, maintaining the metastable state by adding a predetermined amount of the substance to the solvent volume containing the substance and the precipitate or allowing the solvent to evaporate until at least one crystal of a predetermined size is formed. |