DOE PAGES title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Systematic Parameterization of Lignin for the CHARMM Force Field

Journal Article · · Green Chemistry
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1039/C8GC03209B · OSTI ID:1495650
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [1];  [4]
  1. National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
  2. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
  3. Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, WI (United States)
  4. Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, WI (United States); National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)

Lignin is an abundant aromatic biopolymer within plant cell walls formed through radical coupling chemistry, whose composition and topology can vary greatly depending on the biomass source. Computational modeling provides a complementary approach to traditional experimental techniques to probe lignin interactions, lignin structure, and lignin material properties. However, current modeling approaches are limited based on the subset of lignin chemistries covered by existing lignin force fields. To fill the gap, we developed a comprehensive lignin force field that accounts for more lignin-lignin and lignin-carbohydrate interlinkages than existing lignin force fields, and also greatly expands the lignin monomer chemistries that can be modeled beyond simple alcohols and into the rich mixture of natural lignin varieties. The development of this force field utilizes recent developments in parameterization methodology, and synthesizes them into a workflow that combines target data from multiple molecules simultaneously into a single consistent and comprehensive parameter set. The parameter set represents a significant improvement to alternatives for atomic modeling of diverse lignin topologies, more accurately reproducing experimental observables while also significantly reducing the error relative to quantum calculations. The improved energetics, as well as the rigid adherence to CHARMM parameterization philosophy, enables simulation of lignin within its biological context with greater accuracy than was previously possible. The lignin force field presented here is therefore a crucial first step towards modeling lignin structure across a broad range of environments, including within plant cell walls where lignin is complexed with carbohydrates and deconstructed by bacterial or fungal enzymes, or as it exists within industrial solvent mixtures. Future simulations enabled by this updated lignin force field will thus lead to better chemical and structural understanding of lignin, providing new insight into its role in biomass recalcitrance or probing the potential for lignin to be used within industrial processes.

Research Organization:
Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center, Madison, WI (United States); National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE; USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Bioenergy Technologies Office (EE-3B); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER) (SC-23)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC05-00OR22725; SC0018409
OSTI ID:
1495650
Report Number(s):
NREL/JA--2700-70925
Journal Information:
Green Chemistry, Journal Name: Green Chemistry Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 21; ISSN GRCHFJ; ISSN 1463-9262
Publisher:
Royal Society of ChemistryCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

References (126)

Molecular simulation as a tool for studying lignin journal December 2011
Development and testing of a general amber force field journal January 2004
Empirical force fields for biological macromolecules: Overview and issues journal January 2004
UCSF Chimera?A visualization system for exploratory research and analysis journal January 2004
Scalable molecular dynamics with NAMD journal January 2005
GROMACS: Fast, flexible, and free journal January 2005
Additive empirical force field for hexopyranose monosaccharides journal November 2008
A molecular mechanics force field for lignin journal February 2009
Rapid parameterization of small molecules using the force field toolkit journal September 2013
Robustness in the fitting of molecular mechanics parameters journal March 2015
Additive CHARMM force field for naturally occurring modified ribonucleotides: CHARMM Potential Energy Function journal February 2016
Proof of the presence of racemic forms of arylglycerol-Β-aryl ether structure in lignin: studies on the stereo structure of lignin by ozonation journal October 2000
On the stereochemistry of lignin model compounds of the arylglycerol-?-aryl ether type: Crystal structure oferythro-1-(4-hydroxy-3,5-dimethoxyphenyl)-2-(4-hydroxymethyl-2,6-dimethoxyphenoxy)-1,3-propanediol, C20H26O9 journal April 1989
Quantification of lignin–carbohydrate linkages with high-resolution NMR spectroscopy journal February 2011
Determination of vaporization enthalpies of simple organic molecules by correlations of changes in gas chromatographic net retention times journal January 1995
VMD: Visual molecular dynamics journal February 1996
Constant temperature simulations using the Langevin equation with velocity Verlet integration journal September 1998
Lignin-derived inhibition of monocomponent cellulases and a xylanase in the hydrolysis of lignocellulosics journal May 2017
Superior plant based carbon fibers from electrospun poly-(caffeyl alcohol) lignin journal July 2016
Cellulase–lignin interactions—The role of carbohydrate-binding module and pH in non-productive binding journal October 2013
Enhancing muconic acid production from glucose and lignin-derived aromatic compounds via increased protocatechuate decarboxylase activity journal December 2016
Complexes with lignin model compound vanillic acid. Two different carboxylate ligands in the same dinuclear tetracarboxylate complex [Cu2(C8H7O4)2(O2CCH3)2(CH3OH)2] journal March 2006
GROMACS: High performance molecular simulations through multi-level parallelism from laptops to supercomputers journal September 2015
Di-hydroxybenzenes: Catechol, resorcinol, and hydroquinone journal May 2008
Quantification of Lignin and Its Structural Features in Plant Biomass Using 13 C Lignin as Internal Standard for Pyrolysis-GC-SIM-MS journal October 2017
Bright Side of Lignin Depolymerization: Toward New Platform Chemicals journal January 2018
A Stochastic Method to Generate Libraries of Structural Representations of Lignin journal June 2016
Computational Generation of Lignin Libraries from Diverse Biomass Sources journal July 2017
Reactive Molecular Dynamics Simulations of Biomass Pyrolysis and Combustion under Various Oxidative and Humidity Environments journal October 2017
VFFDT: A New Software for Preparing AMBER Force Field Parameters for Metal-Containing Molecular Systems journal March 2016
TopoGromacs: Automated Topology Conversion from CHARMM to GROMACS within VMD journal May 2016
OPLS3: A Force Field Providing Broad Coverage of Drug-like Small Molecules and Proteins journal December 2015
Machine Learning Force Field Parameters from Ab Initio Data journal August 2017
Building a More Predictive Protein Force Field: A Systematic and Reproducible Route to AMBER-FB15 journal April 2017
Machine Learning Force Fields: Construction, Validation, and Outlook journal December 2016
From Tree to Tape: Direct Synthesis of Pressure Sensitive Adhesives from Depolymerized Raw Lignocellulosic Biomass journal May 2018
Radical Nature of C-Lignin journal May 2016
Significance of Lignin S/G Ratio in Biomass Recalcitrance of Populus trichocarpa Variants for Bioethanol Production journal December 2017
Continuous Co-Crystallization As a Separation Technology: The Study of 1:2 Co-Crystals of Phenazine–Vanillin journal November 2012
Charge Density Analysis of Ferulic Acid: Robustness of a Trifurcated C–H···O Hydrogen Bond journal November 2012
Practical Considerations for Building GROMOS-Compatible Small-Molecule Topologies journal November 2010
Automation of the CHARMM General Force Field (CGenFF) I: Bond Perception and Atom Typing journal November 2012
Automation of the CHARMM General Force Field (CGenFF) II: Assignment of Bonded Parameters and Partial Atomic Charges journal November 2012
Fitting of Dihedral Terms in Classical Force Fields as an Analytic Linear Least-Squares Problem journal July 2014
Application of Molecular Dynamics Simulations in Molecular Property Prediction. 1. Density and Heat of Vaporization journal June 2011
CHARMM Additive All-Atom Force Field for Carbohydrate Derivatives and Its Utility in Polysaccharide and Carbohydrate–Protein Modeling journal August 2011
Optimization of the Additive CHARMM All-Atom Protein Force Field Targeting Improved Sampling of the Backbone ϕ, ψ and Side-Chain χ 1 and χ 2 Dihedral Angles journal August 2012
Automated Force Field Parameterization for Nonpolarizable and Polarizable Atomic Models Based on Ab Initio Target Data journal July 2013
P-LINCS:  A Parallel Linear Constraint Solver for Molecular Simulation journal December 2007
CHARMM Additive All-Atom Force Field for Glycosidic Linkages between Hexopyranoses journal August 2009
The OPLS [optimized potentials for liquid simulations] potential functions for proteins, energy minimizations for crystals of cyclic peptides and crambin journal March 1988
Thermochemical Study of the Methoxy- and Dimethoxyphenol Isomers journal May 2003
Structural Analysis of Wheat Straw Lignin by Quantitative 31 P and 2D NMR Spectroscopy. The Occurrence of Ester Bonds and α-O-4 Substructures journal April 1997
Are Lignins Optically Active? journal August 1999
Radical Coupling Reactions in Lignin Synthesis: A Density Functional Theory Study journal April 2012
Update to the General Amber Force Field for Small Solutes with an Emphasis on Free Energies of Hydration journal March 2014
CHARMM Additive All-Atom Force Field for Aldopentofuranoses, Methyl-aldopentofuranosides, and Fructofuranose journal September 2009
All-Atom Empirical Potential for Molecular Modeling and Dynamics Studies of Proteins journal April 1998
Building Force Fields: An Automatic, Systematic, and Reproducible Approach journal May 2014
Disruption of Mediator rescues the stunted growth of a lignin-deficient Arabidopsis mutant journal March 2014
Large historical growth in global terrestrial gross primary production journal April 2017
Lignin Valorization: Two Hybrid Biochemical Routes for the Conversion of Polymeric Lignin into Value-added Chemicals journal August 2017
Organosolv-Water Cosolvent Phase Separation on Cellulose and its Influence on the Physical Deconstruction of Cellulose: A Molecular Dynamics Analysis journal November 2017
Rational identification and characterisation of peptide ligands for targeting polysialic acid journal May 2020
NADPH levels affect cellular epigenetic state by inhibiting HDAC3–Ncor complex journal January 2021
Understanding the role of water during ionic liquid pretreatment of lignocellulose: co-solvent or anti-solvent? journal January 2014
Cosolvent pretreatment in cellulosic biofuel production: effect of tetrahydrofuran-water on lignin structure and dynamics journal January 2016
ANI-1: an extensible neural network potential with DFT accuracy at force field computational cost journal January 2017
Profiling of diferulates (plant cell wall cross-linkers) using ultrahigh-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry journal January 2013
Synthesis and crystal structure determination of model compounds for the dibenzodioxocine structure occurring in wood lignins journal January 1996
Molecular dynamics with coupling to an external bath journal October 1984
The Nose–Hoover thermostat journal October 1985
A smooth particle mesh Ewald method journal November 1995
Constant pressure molecular dynamics simulation: The Langevin piston method journal September 1995
Ab initio quantum chemistry: Methodology and applications journal May 2005
A polymer of caffeyl alcohol in plant seeds journal January 2012
Feruloylation in Grasses: Current and Future Perspectives journal September 2009
The origin of biological homochirality journal October 2011
The Origin of Biological Homochirality journal March 2010
The Origin of Biological Homochirality journal March 2019
Note on an Approximation Treatment for Many-Electron Systems journal October 1934
A Simplification of the Hartree-Fock Method journal February 1951
Lignin Biosynthesis and Structure journal May 2010
Mass Spectrometry-Based Sequencing of Lignin Oligomers journal June 2010
Tricin, a Flavonoid Monomer in Monocot Lignification journal February 2015
threo -2-(2,6-Dimethoxyphenoxy)-1-(4-hydroxy-3,5-dimethoxyphenyl)propane-1,3-diol: a conformational study journal March 2005
5,5′-Bis(hydroxymethyl)-3,3′-dimethoxybiphenyl-2,2′-diol with a new three-dimensional 3-modal topology of synthons journal November 2010
erythro -2-(2,6-Dimethoxyphenoxy)-1-(4-hydroxy-3,5-dimethoxyphenyl)-1,3-propanediol journal December 2001
(+)-Pinoresinol–dioxane (1/1) journal November 2003
A second polymorph of (+)-pinoresinol–dioxane (1/1) journal December 2003
4-Hydroxy-3,5-dimethoxybenzaldehyde (syringaldehyde) journal July 2004
Redetermination of 4-hydroxybenzaldehyde journal December 2007
The Cambridge Structural Database
  • Groom, Colin R.; Bruno, Ian J.; Lightfoot, Matthew P.
  • Acta Crystallographica Section B Structural Science, Crystal Engineering and Materials, Vol. 72, Issue 2, p. 171-179 https://doi.org/10.1107/S2052520616003954
journal April 2016
Matplotlib: A 2D Graphics Environment journal January 2007
The NumPy Array: A Structure for Efficient Numerical Computation journal March 2011
XSEDE: Accelerating Scientific Discovery journal September 2014
A (sub)graph isomorphism algorithm for matching large graphs journal October 2004
Cell-wall carbohydrates and their modification as a resource for biofuels journal May 2008
Tricin-lignins: occurrence and quantitation of tricin in relation to phylogeny journal November 2016
Terrestrial Gross Carbon Dioxide Uptake: Global Distribution and Covariation with Climate journal July 2010
Lignin Valorization: Improving Lignin Processing in the Biorefinery journal May 2014
Scalable parallel programming with CUDA journal March 2008
Scalable parallel programming with CUDA conference January 2008
Algorithm 778: L-BFGS-B: Fortran subroutines for large-scale bound-constrained optimization journal December 1997
Biomolecular Simulation: A Computational Microscope for Molecular Biology journal June 2012
Lignin Biosynthesis journal June 2003
Lignin triggers irreversible cellulase loss during pretreated lignocellulosic biomass saccharification journal December 2014
Mechanism of lignin inhibition of enzymatic biomass deconstruction journal December 2015
Inhibition of lignin-derived phenolic compounds to cellulase journal March 2016
The impact of alterations in lignin deposition on cellulose organization of the plant cell wall journal June 2016
Computational ‘microscopy’ of cellular membranes journal January 2016
Genome-Wide Association Mapping and Genomic Selection for Alfalfa (Medicago sativa) Forage Quality Traits journal January 2017
On the Occurrence of Structural Elements of the Lignan Type (ß—ß Structures) in Lignins - The Crystal Structures of (+)-Pinoresinol and (±)- trans -3,4-Divanillyltetrahydrofuran journal January 1988
Crystal structure of 2,3,4,5,6-pentaacetyl-(N-allyl)-D-gluconamide, C19H27NO11 journal April 1998
Lignin Radicals in the Plant Cell Wall Probed by Kerr-Gated Resonance Raman Spectroscopy journal April 2006
ANI-1: an extensible neural network potential with DFT accuracy at force field computational cost text January 2017
Stereochemistry oflignin structures of the ß-0-4 type journal January 1994
Stereochemistry of lignin structures of the arylglycerol ß-aryl ether type journal January 1996
Variation in susceptibility to microbial lignin oxidation in a set of wheat straw cultivars: influence of genetic, seasonal and environmental factors - OPEN ACCESS journal December 2017
Current Understanding of the Correlation of Lignin Structure with Biomass Recalcitrance journal November 2016
Lignin Composition and Structure Differs between Xylem, Phloem and Phellem in Quercus suber L. journal October 2016
Determining the Composition of Lignins in Different Tissues of Silver Birch journal April 2015
The Crystal Structure of trans-2,3-Dihydro-2-(4-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenyl)-3-hydroxymethyl-7-methoxybenzofuran. journal January 1987
Studies on Lignin Model Compounds of the beta-O-4 Type: Crystal Structures of threo-1-(4-Hydroxy-3,5-dimethoxyphenyl)-2-(2-methoxyphenoxy)-1,3-propanediol and 3-Hydroxy-1-(4-hydroxy-3,5-dimethoxyphenyl)-2-(2-methoxyphenoxy)-1-propanone--Methanol (1/1). journal January 1988
Machine learning force fields: Construction, validation, and outlook preprint January 2016
Profiling of diferulates (plant cell wall cross-linkers) using ultrahigh-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry text January 2013

Cited By (1)

Passive membrane transport of lignin-related compounds journal October 2019