Ribbon

The `Ribbon' representation is similar to `Tube' in that it follows the same spline curve for both the protein and nucleic acids. However, it uses additional information (the O of the protein backbone or some of the phosphate oxygens for nucleic acids) to find a normal for drawing the oriented ribbon. (There may be some problems with the ribbon definition for nucleic acids as it is possible for the nucleic acid detection routine to label a residue as a nucleic acid even though it does not have phosphate oxygens.)

Given the coordinates of each atom and the offset vector for the ribbon vector, the drawing code finds the spline curves for the top and bottom of the ribbon. The two splines are connected by triangles and both splines are drawn as small tubes. As with the `Tube' representation, the six ribbon segments nearest the given atom are drawn with the color assigned to that atom and the atom can be selected by clicking near the center of those six elements.

Bond radius and resolution modify the tubes that make up the top and bottom of the ribbon. If the radius or resolution get too small, the tubes are not drawn (this speeds up drawing time by an appreciable amount). The line thickness controls the width of the ribbon and make it look like everything from vermicelli to lasagna. Additionally, the sugars are drawn filled in with triangles. This helps highlight the pucker.

Thanks to Ethan Merrit for the ribbon drawing algorithm taken from Raster3D.