Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Hydration dynamics near a model protein surface

Journal Article · · Biophysical Journal
OSTI ID:834632

The evolution of water dynamics from dilute to very high concentration solutions of a prototypical hydrophobic amino acid with its polar backbone, N-acetyl-leucine-methylamide (NALMA), is studied by quasi-elastic neutron scattering and molecular dynamics simulation for both the completely deuterated and completely hydrogenated leucine monomer. We observe several unexpected features in the dynamics of these biological solutions under ambient conditions. The NALMA dynamics shows evidence of de Gennes narrowing, an indication of coherent long timescale structural relaxation dynamics. The translational water dynamics are analyzed in a first approximation with a jump diffusion model. At the highest solute concentrations, the hydration water dynamics is significantly suppressed and characterized by a long residential time and a slow diffusion coefficient. The analysis of the more dilute concentration solutions takes into account the results of the 2.0M solution as a model of the first hydration shell. Subtracting the first hydration layer based on the 2.0M spectra, the translational diffusion dynamics is still suppressed, although the rotational relaxation time and residential time are converged to bulk-water values. Molecular dynamics analysis shows spatially heterogeneous dynamics at high concentration that becomes homogeneous at more dilute concentrations. We discuss the hydration dynamics results of this model protein system in the context of glassy systems, protein function, and protein-protein interfaces.

Research Organization:
Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA (US)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Director. Office of Science. Office of Computational and Technology Research; National Institutes of Health Grant GM65239-01, National Science Foundation Agreement DMR-0086210 (US)
DOE Contract Number:
AC03-76SF00098
OSTI ID:
834632
Report Number(s):
LBNL--53863
Journal Information:
Biophysical Journal, Journal Name: Biophysical Journal Journal Issue: 3 Vol. 86
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

Similar Records

Hydration water dynamics and instigation of protein structuralrelaxation
Technical Report · Mon Sep 01 00:00:00 EDT 2003 · OSTI ID:927173

Depolarized light scattering and dielectric response of a peptide dissolved in water
Journal Article · Mon Jan 20 23:00:00 EST 2014 · Journal of Chemical Physics · OSTI ID:22255240

Temperature dependence of protein hydration hydrodynamics by molecular dynamics simulations.
Journal Article · Wed Jul 18 00:00:00 EDT 2007 · Biophysical Chemistry · OSTI ID:921159