The CAHRA Challenge: A Community-Wide Assessment of Cryo-EM Heterogeneous Reconstruction Algorithms

The ability of cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) to interrogate the atomic structure and motion of biomolecules has motivated the development of a wide range of algorithms for heterogeneity analysis. However, evaluating and comparing these methods remains challenging because ground-truth structures are generally unknown for experimental samples. Here, we introduce the 2026 Community-Wide Assessment of Heterogeneous Reconstruction Algorithms (CAHRA), a community-wide challenge centered on three benchmark datasets that probe distinct tasks in heterogeneity analysis. These include (1) compositional heterogeneity arising from mixtures of distinct protein complexes, (2) continuous conformational variability and atomic modeling, and (3) entanglement between molecular conformation and image pose. We describe the design, construction, and validation of these datasets, as well as their use in the recently completed CAHRA Challenge.

Recommended citation: J. Ryan Feathers, Robert C. Heeter, Geofrey Woollard, Sonya M. Hanson, Pilar Cossio, Joel Greer, Tom Burnley, Ellen D. Zhong. (2026). "The CAHRA Challenge: A Community-Wide Assessment of Cryo-EM Heterogeneous Reconstruction Algorithmss." bioRxiv.
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