Hydrogen bonds in crystalline d-alanine: diffraction and spectroscopic evidence for differences between enantiomers

Enantiomeric amino acids have specific physiological functions in complex biological systems. Systematic studies focusing on the solid-state properties of d-amino acids are, however, still limited. To shed light on this field, structural and spectroscopic studies of d-alanine using neutron powder di...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ezequiel A. Belo, Jose E. M. Pereira, Paulo T. C. Freire, Dimitri N. Argyriou, Juergen Eckert, Heloisa N. Bordallo
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: International Union of Crystallography 2018-01-01
Series:IUCrJ
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Online Access:http://scripts.iucr.org/cgi-bin/paper?S2052252517015573
Description
Summary:Enantiomeric amino acids have specific physiological functions in complex biological systems. Systematic studies focusing on the solid-state properties of d-amino acids are, however, still limited. To shed light on this field, structural and spectroscopic studies of d-alanine using neutron powder diffraction, polarized Raman scattering and ab initio calculations of harmonic vibrational frequencies were carried out. Clear changes in the number of vibrational modes are observed as a function of temperature, which can be directly connected to variations of the N—D bond lengths. These results reveal dissimilarities in the structural properties of d-alanine compared with l-alanine.
ISSN:2052-2525