The Protein Data Bank (PDB) is the definitive repository of macromolecular structural information. The availability of structure factors for most entries in the PDB has made it possible to continuously improve the models in the PDB by reinterpreting the primary data for existing structures as new methods of analysis, new biological information, and new ways of describing structures become available. This continuous improvement will be even more powerful once the diffraction images associated with each entry become accessible. The key factor is that depositing raw images will stimulate the improvement of integration and processing software in the same way as the deposition of merged X-ray data hugely stimulated progress in refinement software. Revisiting deposited images with that improved software will deliver more accurate data (especially, free from the currently inadequate treatment of contamination by multiple lattices) against which to re-refine the deposited structures themselves. With the initial interpretation of a structure, the original structure factors and the raw images, it will become possible both to carry out extensive validation of structures and to apply new algorithms for structure determination and analysis as they become available, leading to structures of ever-increasing accuracy and completeness.
