Visualizing the future of molecular graphics

The field of computer graphics has played an important role in the advancement of structural molecular biology and in the development of structure-based drug design. This article will provide a brief background on the development of this technology, and then focus on the current trends and future directions in molecular graphics and how they will impact the practice of molecular modeling and design. Specific areas that will be covered include: 1) the development of surface and volume based representations of molecular properties and interactions; 2) new approaches to modeling flexible and multi-component structures, and 3) the impact of object-oriented graphics-based programming and the rapidly growing use of network based computing.