Files and metadata associated with the EMDataBank/Unified Data Resource for 3DEM 2015/2016 Models Challenge hosted at challenges.emdatabank.org are deposited. All members of the Scientific Community--at all levels of experience--were invited to participate as Challengers, and/or as Assessors. Eight recently determined target structures were selected for the challenge. All of the maps were archived in the EM Data Bank (EMDB; http://emdatabank.org). In total 16 Challengers created 106 models and uploaded their results with associated details. In the zip files, each entry is represented in a folder containing the original deposition upload (deposited_EM.pdb), initial processing at RCSB/Rutgers (deposited_EM_edited.pdb, maxit.cif, maxit.cif.pdb) and final model version evaluated (model-compare.pdb) at UC Davis (http://model-compare.emdatabank.org). This model challenge was one of two community-wide challenges sponsored by EMDataBank in 2015/2016 to critically evaluate 3DEM methods that are coming into use, with the ultimate goal of developing validation criteria associated with every 3DEM map and map-derived model.

{"references": ["Henderson et al (2012) Outcome of the first electron microscopy validation task force meeting. doi:10.1016/j.str.2011.12.014", "Lawson et al (2016) EMDataBank unified data resource for 3DEM. doi:10.1093/nar/gkv1126"]}

The 2015/2016 Model Challenge was supported by the US National Institutes of Health / National Institute for General Medical Sciences (NIH/NIGMS) Under Grant Number R01 GM079429 to Wah Chiu (PI).