Icons in the Right Mouse tab of the Toolbar (along with those in the Markers tab) allow reassigning the function or “mouse mode” of:
on Mac)
in the ChimeraX graphics window
(On Windows or Linux, right-click elsewhere in the ChimeraX interface raises a context menu.)
The icon for the current right-mouse assignment is highlighted in the Toolbar. A specific mouse button can only be assigned one function at a time.
With the related mousemode command, functions can be assigned to all mouse buttons (not just the right) and to scrolling, alone and in combination with modifier keys. See also: vr button, Marker Placement, Measure and Color Blobs, Map Eraser, Trackpad preferences
| icon | mousemode
function (default assignment, if any) |
description |
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select (control left) |
select items for subsequent operations, +Shift to toggle or add to selection; see also select and differences in VR |
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rotate (left) |
XY-rotate
(screen coordinates)
with cursor in central part of window,
Z-rotate with cursor in periphery, except if wheel, Y-rotate only;
see also turn,
roll,
tile;
assigned button + Shift switches to translate instead; assigned button + Ctrl (where Ctrl must be pressed last) switches to Z-rotation instead (or Z-translation with vertical drag, if Shift is also pressed) |
 |
translate (middle, right) |
XY-translate
(screen coordinates),
except if wheel, Z-translate;
see also move;
assigned button + Shift switches to rotate instead; assigned button + Ctrl (where Ctrl must be pressed last) switches to Z-translation with vertical drag instead (or Z-rotation, if Shift is also pressed) |
 |
zoom (wheel) |
zoom the view (slightly different in VR and in stereo); see also zoom |
 |
translate selected models | translate models with any part
selected, or if no selection, all models;
assigned button + Shift switches to rotate selected models instead; assigned button + Ctrl (where Ctrl must be pressed last) switches to Z-translation with vertical drag instead (or Z-rotation, if Shift is also pressed) |
 |
rotate selected models | rotate models with any part
selected, or if no selection, all models;
assigned button + Shift switches to translate selected models instead; assigned button + Ctrl (where Ctrl must be pressed last) switches to Z-rotation instead (or Z-translation with vertical drag, if Shift is also pressed) |
 |
move picked model | translate the model under the mouseclick;
assigned button + Shift switches to rotation instead; assigned button + Ctrl (where Ctrl must be pressed last) switches to Z-translation with vertical drag instead (or Z-rotation, if Shift is also pressed) |
 |
translate selected atoms | translate any
selected atoms, or if no selection, all models;
assigned button + Shift switches to rotate selected atoms instead; assigned button + Ctrl (where Ctrl must be pressed last) switches to Z-translation with vertical drag instead (or Z-rotation, if Shift is also pressed) |
 |
pivot | set center of rotation to clicked atom, bond, ribbon segment, or surface point; see also cofr |
 |
distance | add distance monitor pseudobond between two successively clicked atoms or remove existing distance monitor; see also distance, label, and the tape measure mode |
 |
label | label/unlabel clicked atom or ribbon segment
with residue name and number (slightly different in VR),
unlabel all residues when background is clicked; see also label |
 |
move label | move 2D label, 2D arrow (by dragging either end), or “3D” label |
 |
color key | set color key location and dimensions by clicking and dragging; a previously created color key can be moved by clicking near its center and dragging, but clicking elsewhere will delete the key and start over |
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clip | click without dragging to activate/deactivate clipping, click-drag to activate (if clipping is not yet active) and translate front or near plane, +Alt back or far plane, +Shift slab (translate paired planes in same direction), +Alt-Shift slab thickness (translate paired planes in opposite directions); whether activation applies to front/back planes that rotate with the scene or near/far planes that remain parallel to the screen is set in the Clipping preferences; see also clip |
 |
clip rotate | click without dragging to activate/deactivate clipping, click-drag to activate (if not already active) and rotate front/back clipping planes; see also clip |
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zone | limit atomic and volume data display to a zone around the clicked residue (details...) |
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contour level | adjust volume data threshold level; see also volume |
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move planes | show single plane of clicked volume data if full region shown initially; move plane or slab along its axis to show a different section |
 |
rotate slab |
activate tilted slab
slicing of volume data (image style only),
rotate the slab to adjust the slicing angle;
the center of rotation from clicking over the slab is the center of the slab,
and from clicking elsewhere is the center of the volume box;
assigned button + Shift translates the slab along its axis; in VR, this mode both rotates and translates the slab |
 |
crop volume | show volume data outline box and adjust region size by dragging any face; see also volume and differences in VR |
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tape measure | click to anchor distance measurement, drag to desired endpoint; click in empty space to “erase” (details...); see also the distance mode |
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pick blobs | pick surface blob to measure area, volume, size; see also measure blob |
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map eraser | move map eraser sphere; see also volume erase |
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play map series | play volume series, with wrapping; see also vseries |
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windowing | adjust volume data image display thresholds collectively: vertical motion adjusts window level (moves all thresholds in parallel to higher or lower values), horizontal motion adjusts window width (moves thresholds symmetrically farther apart or closer together), and the dominant type of motion wins out; for adjusting multiple windows within a single histogram, see details |
 |
bond rotation | adjust torsion angle (original position not retained) by clicking a bond and dragging vertically, +Shift to move the larger set of atoms in the molecule instead of the smaller; see also torsion, Adjust Torsions |
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swapaa | “mutate” and label the amino acid residue under the mouseclick, with vertical drag cycling through the 20 standard types in arbitrary conformations; original sidechain not retained |
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play coordinates | drag up/down or left/right to play through the coordinate sets in each displayed trajectory; dragging horizontally the full width of the graphics window (or in VR, 50 cm vertically) plays the whole trajectory |
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tug | drag atoms and apply OpenMM dynamics while button is held down (details...); original coordinates not retained; see also tug |
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minimize | jiggle residue and its neighbors with OpenMM dynamics while button is held down (details...); original coordinates not retained |
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next docked | drag to show the next/previous docked ligand when docking results are open in ViewDockX |
The tape measure mouse mode creates one or more pairs of markers with a distance label on the link between them. Clicking (without releasing) the assigned button over volume data, an atom, cartoon, or molecular surface anchors the measurement; dragging adjusts the measurement dynamically, and releasing the button places the second marker. The release point can be anywhere, even empty space. Except in VR, clicking the assigned button in empty space or clicking and releasing without dragging more than 5 screen pixels removes the measurements.
Except in VR, the method of marker placement depends on what is “under” the cursor when the assigned button is clicked or released:
The markers and links are created as a model named tape measure. The link radius is set to 25% of the minimum grid spacing if/when a measurement is anchored on volume data, otherwise remaining at 0.1 Å, and the distance label height is set to 10% of the distance but no less than the link diameter. Label height and color can be changed with the label command, and marker/link radius and color changed with Marker Placement or the marker change command.
Tape-measure differences in virtual reality:
See also: Distances, measurements
To work with the tug or minimize mouse modes, the entire atomic model must be parametrized in OpenMM, meaning that the structure:
The tug mode runs dynamics on the entire atomic model. A model named Tug arrow is added to show the location and direction of tugging. The minimize mode jiggles the residue under the mouseclick along with other residues within 3 Å of the first. These mousemodes use a variable time step Langevin integrator with tolerance 0.001, temperature 100K, nonbonded cutoff 10 Å, and 10 time steps between coordinate updates, with energy minimization occurring automatically if a maximum force is exceeded due to bad geometry. Different models do not “feel” the effects of each other; that is, only intra-model forces apply.
Users may wish to save a session before using either of these mouse modes, since the resulting changes in structure cannot be reversed with undo or by restoring a previously saved view. See also the tug command.
The zone mouse mode limits atomic detail and volume data (map) display to a zone around the clicked residue and labels the residues in the zone. Except in VR, the remaining residues of the same atomic model are shown as a narrow ribbon. Subsequently clicking the background clears the labels, and clicking the background a second time returns to what was shown before the residue was clicked. Cutoff distances from the clicked residue are initially 5, 4, and 8 Å for residue atoms, residue labels, and map displays, respectively, but can be increased/decreased in increments of 30% by dragging up/down with the assigned button. These zoning actions are implemented via the zone command, which can also be used to adjust zone size. Other parameters such as label color can be changed with zone setting. See also: surface zone, volume zone (with newMap false), select zone, zone atom specification
The windowing mode adjusts volume data image display thresholds collectively: vertical motion adjusts window level (moves all thresholds in parallel to higher or lower values) and horizontal motion adjusts window width (moves thresholds symmetrically farther apart or closer together). The dominant type of motion wins out, i.e., a diagonal motion will not change both level and width.
A single transfer function (set of thresholds for an image display) may contain multiple windows, where each window contains one or more thresholds with vertical values above zero and is separated horizontally from other windows by at least two thresholds at the vertical zero. The chest preset is an example of this situation. The windowing mode initially applies to the leftmost window. Click-release of the assigned button without dragging switches the target of this mode to the next window (going from left to right), eventually wrapping around from the rightmost to the leftmost. Any changes in window level and width are limited by “bumping” into a neighboring window.
In virtual reality, mouse modes that normally require clicking on an atom (select, label, etc.) require pointing at the atom with the hand-controller cone and pressing the assigned button. Most modes that normally involve clicking and dragging are operated by clicking and moving the hand controller vertically. The bond rotation mode requires rotating the hand controller. Some of the mouse modes are modified in VR:
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