Probing the gel to liquid-crystalline phase transition and relevant conformation changes in liposomes by (13)C magic-angle spinning NMR spectroscopy.

A straightforward way to visualize gel to liquid-crystalline phase transition in phospholipid membranes is presented by using ¹³C magic-angle spinning NMR. The changes in the 13C isotropic chemical shifts with increasing temperature are shown to be a sensitive probe of the main thermotropic phase transition related to lipid hydrocarbon chain dynamics and relevant conformational changes. The average value of the energy difference between trans and gauche states in the central C4­11 fragment of the DMPC acyl chain was estimated to be 4.02 ± 0.2 kJ mol⁻¹ in the liquid crystalline phase. The reported spectral features will be useful in 13C solid state NMR studies for direct monitoring of the effective lipid chain melting allowing rapid uniaxial rotation of membrane proteins in the biologically relevant liquid-crystalline phase.

Probing structural and motional features of organic and inorganic solids through extended family of cross-polarization experiments.

Combined use of cross-polarization and magic-angle spinning in the middle of the seventies has opened a new era of high-resolution solid-state NMR spectroscopy. Cross-polarization procedure is commonly used to obtain a shorter measuring time and to investigate or exploit one nucleous by means of the other nucleous involved in the polarization transfer. An extended family of cross-polarization experiments including constant time cross-polarization approach, cross-polarization inversion and indirect observation of proton spin system is reviewed and illustrated with applications to a large range of solids.

Quantitative one- and two-dimensional 13C spectra of microcrystalline proteins with enhanced intensity.

We recorded quantitative, uniformly enhanced one- and two-dimensional (13)C spectra of labelled microcrystalline proteins. The approach takes advantage of efficient equilibration of magnetization by low-power proton irradiation using Phase Alternated Recoupling Irradiation Schemes and benefits simultaneously from uniform sensitivity enhancement due to efficient spin exchange that can overcome T1((13)C) constraints and the presence of heteronuclear Overhauser effects.

Sensitive (13)C- (13)C correlation spectra of amyloid fibrils at very high spinning frequencies and magnetic fields.

Sensitive 2D solid-state (13)C-(13)C correlation spectra of amyloid ß fibrils have been recorded at very fast spinning frequencies and very high magnetic fields. It is demonstrated that PARIS-xy recoupling using moderate rf amplitudes can provide structural information by promoting efficient magnetization transfer even under such challenging experimental conditions. Furthermore, it has been shown both experimentally and by numerical simulations that the method is not very sensitive to dipolar truncation effects and can reveal direct transfer across distances of about 3.5-4 Å.

Efficiency at high spinning frequencies of heteronuclear decoupling methods designed to quench rotary resonance.

The performance of two recently developed heteronuclear decoupling schemes designed to quench rotary resonance, phase-inverted supercycled sequence for attenuation of rotary resonance (PISSARRO) and high-phase two-pulse phase modulation (high-phase TPPM), are probed at high spinning frequencies. High-phase TPPM may be useful at the n=1 rotary resonance condition while PISSARRO permits efficient decoupling over a broad commonly used range of rf amplitudes, even at very high spinning frequencies. New insights into the response of spin systems to both decoupling schemes have been gained. High-phase TPPM is sensitive to the offsets of remote protons, their chemical shift anisotropies, and the relative orientations of the heteronuclear dipolar and proton chemical shift tensors. Since PISSARRO is virtually immune against such effects, the method is especially suited for very high magnetic fields.

Broadband carbon-13 correlation spectra of microcrystalline proteins in very high magnetic fields.

PARIS recoupling irradiation, despite a low rf amplitude, can promote efficient magnetization transfer during solid-state NMR experiments at 900 MHz over a wide range of differences in isotropic chemical shifts in microcrystalline proteins.

Proton chemical shift anisotropy measurements of hydrogen-bonded functional groups by fast magic-angle spinning solid-state NMR spectroscopy.

The suitability of fast MAS solid-state NMR spectroscopy for probing (1)H chemical shift anisotropy of hydrogen-bonded species has been demonstrated.

Revealing molecular self-assembly and geometry of non-covalent halogen bonding by solid-state NMR spectroscopy.

We report a new spectroscopic fingerprint of intermolecular contacts in halogen bond-driven self-assembling aggregates and a precise determination of intermolecular NI distances in microcrystalline samples.

Straightforward detection of the secondary ionisation of the phosphate group and pK determinations by high-resolution solid-state 31P NMR.

The suitability of high-resolution solid-state 31P NMR for a straightforward determination of the protonation state of phosphate groups as well as of their pK2 values extracted from solid state mono : dianionic ratios has been demonstrated.

Determination of sample temperature in unstable static fields by combining solid-state (79)Br and (13)C NMR.

Monitoring the isotropic chemical shifts to calibrate the sample temperature presupposes a perfect stability of the static magnetic field. It can be difficult to satisfy this requirement in solid-state NMR measurements. This paper describes a simple way to recover the accurate temperature dependence of the (79)Br resonance after subtracting changes of resonance frequency due to variations of the static field, monitored by the (13)C resonance.

Probing structural and motional features of the C-terminal part of the Human Centrin 2/P17-XPC microcrystalline complex by solid-state NMR spectroscopy.

Insight into structural and motional features of the C-terminal part of the Human Centrin 2 in complex with the peptide P17-XPC was obtained by using complementary solid-state NMR methods. We demonstrate that the experimental conditions and procedures of sample crystallization determine the quality of solid-state NMR spectra and the internal mobility of the protein. Two-dimensional (2D) (13)C-(13)C and (15)N-(15)N correlation spectra reveal intra- and inter-residue dipolar connectivities and provide partial, site-specific assignments of (13)C and (15)N resonance signals. The secondary structure of the C-ter HsCen2/P17-XPC complex in a microcrystalline state appears similar to that found in solution. Conformational flexibility is probed through relaxation-compensated measurements of dipolar order parameters that exploit the dynamics of cross-polarization in multidimensional experiments. The extracted dipolar coupling constants and relevant order parameters reveal increased backbone flexibility of the loops except for residues involved in coordination with the Ca(2+) cation that stabilizes the hydrophobic pocket containing the peptide P17-XPC.

Disentangling crystallographic inequivalence and crystallographic forms of L-arginine by one- and two-dimensional solid-state NMR spectroscopy.

Overlapping (13)C or (15)N solid-state NMR spectra from crystallographically different forms of L-arginine hydrochloride can be separated by exploiting differential proton T(1) relaxation in conjunction with cross-polarization. Dipolar (13)C-(13)C and (15)N-(15)N two-dimensional correlation experiments reveal resonances belonging to crystallographically and magnetically inequivalent molecules.

Improving the quality of 2D solid-state NMR spectra of microcrystalline proteins by covariance analysis.

Gaining time, resolution and sensitivity at the same time: covariance processing of two-dimensional NMR spectra of microcrystalline proteins improves spectral quality over conventional Fourier transformation despite a significant reduction of the experimental time.

Low-power decoupling at high spinning frequencies in high static fields.

We demonstrate that heteronuclear decoupling using a Phase-Inverted Supercycled Sequence for Attenuation of Rotary ResOnance (PISSARRO) is very efficient at high spinning frequencies (nu(rot)=60kHz) and high magnetic fields (900MHz for protons at 21T) even with moderate radio-frequency decoupling amplitudes (nu(1)(I)=15kHz), despite the wide range of isotropic chemical shifts of the protons and the increased effect of their chemical shift anisotropy.

Revealing successive steps of deprotonation of L- phosphoserine through 13C and 31P chemical shielding tensor fingerprints.

The effects of deprotonation on the (13)C and (31)P chemical shielding tensors of L-O-phosphoserine are revealed by using solid-state NMR spectroscopy and ab initio calculations. The characteristic changes in some principal elements of the (13)C and (31)P chemical shift tensors have been detected during successive steps of deprotonation of carboxyl, phosphate, and amide functional groups. The calculations carried out in a polarizable continuum taking into account the effects of the surroundings have shown their ability to reproduce correctly the changes of the principal values induced by deprotonation and to provide precious information, which is very difficult to obtain experimentally, about the concurrent changes in the orientation of chemical shielding tensors in the molecular frame. The experimentally observed subtle effects related to the deprotonation-induced modifications of intermolecular contacts involving hydrogen bonding as well as the influence of counterions on the (13)C and (31)P principal elements of the chemical shift tensors are also discussed.

Determining the geometry of strongly hydrogen-bonded silanols in a layered hydrous silicate by solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance.

High-resolution solid-state NMR spectroscopy is exploited to obtain structural constraints involving strongly hydrogen-bonded silanols in octosilicate, a prominent member of the layered hydrous sodium silicates. Proton-silicon cross-polarization dynamics reveals that octosilicate contains two types of Q(3) silicons present in hydrogen-bonded -Si-O-Hcdots, three dots, centeredO-Si- and -Si-O(-)-type sites which can only be distinguished by their different abilities to cross polarize and the different mobilities of neighboring hydrous species. The theoretical analysis of the oscillating components of the polarization transfer buildup curves suggests that the model of heteronuclear pairs is an adequate description of the quantum spin system within hydrogen-bonded -Si-O-Hcdots, three dots, centeredO-Si- fragments. We also show that dipolar modulated, slow speed magic-angle (29)Si NMR spectrum provides unique geometric information on strongly hydrogen-bonded silanols. The dipolar modulated spinning sidebands contain all the information necessary to determine the internuclear Sicdots, three dots, centeredH distances as well as the magnitude and orientation of the principal elements of the (29)Si chemical shielding tensor in the molecular frame. The data provide definite proof of the intralayer character of strongly hydrogen-bonded silanol groups in a bridging, albeit not symmetric, position between neighboring tetrahedra. The approach developed in this work may be useful to obtain structural information on related layered alkali metal silicates, silica gels as well as on other classes of microporous materials.

Measurement of NMR cross-polarization (CP) rate constants in the slow CP regime: relevance to structure determinations of zeolite-sorbate and other complexes by cp magic-angle spinning NMR.

When analyzing I --> S variable contact time cross-polarization (CP) curves, the spin dynamics are usually assumed to be describable in the "fast CP regime" in which the growth of the S spin magnetization is governed by the rate of cross polarization while its decay is governed by the rate of I spin T1rho relaxation. However, in the investigation of the structures of zeolite-sorbate and other complexes by polarization transfer this will not necessarily be the case. We discuss the measurement of I --> S CP rate constants under the "slow CP regime" in which the rate of T1rho relaxation is fast compared to the rate of cross polarization, leading to a reversal of the usual assumptions such that the rate or growth is governed by the rate of I spin T1rho relaxation while the decay is governed by the rate of cross polarization (and the S spin T1rho relaxation). It is very important to recognize when a system is in the slow CP regime, as an analysis assuming the normal fast CP will lead to erroneous data. However, even when the slow CP regime is recognized, it is difficult to obtain absolute values for the CP rate constants from fits to standard CP curves, since the CP rate constant is correlated to the scaling factor, the contribution from 29Si T1rho relaxation is ignored, and it is difficult to obtain reliable data at very long contact times. The use of a 29Si{1H} CP "drain" or "depolarization" experiment, which measures absolute values of the CP rate constants, is therefore proposed as being most appropriate for theses situations. To illustrate the importance of these observations, measurements of the 1H-29Si CP rate constants in the p-dichlorobenzene/ZSM-5 sorbate-zeolite complex by 29Si{1H} CP and CP drain magic-angle spinning (MAS) NMR experiments are presented and compared and used to determine the location of the guest sorbate molecules in the cavities of the host zeolite framework.