Dipole set models
The dipole set model allows to gather sets of dipoles, each one being an assemble of 3d points called center,north, south and west. Not every point needs to be defined.
When a table is extracted from a dipole set model, each dipole will define a separate particle (i.e., a row in the table). The cropping points will be located each on the center property of each dipole. The cropping angles will be computed so that z direction of the particle is colinear with the north to center axis of the dipole. I a west point is present, the west to center axis will define the x axis of the particle.
Applications
Oriented particles
Sometimes it is useful to be able to directly collect the orientation of the particle from a simple interaction with the tomogram (obviously only for particles with a clearly identifiable directionality). For large data sets, it is not advisable to try to click all your particles with this model: the way we normally use it is to collect moderate numbers of particles (in the order of magnitude of the tenths) to construct an initial reference.
Sets of vesicles
Each dipole has four points available, which can be used with full flexibility as geometrical markers. We frequently use the north and the center to mark vesicular entities in a given tomogram (each dipole being a separate vesicle, and using a single dipole set model to encompass all the models). Some manipulation from the command line allows then to create a real vesicle model for ach dipole in the dipole set model.
