Journal of Physical Chemistry B, Vol.109, No.49, 23674-23678, 2005
Detecting protein-protein interactions by isotope-edited infrared spectroscopy: A numerical approach
We present a theoretical and numerical analysis of the vibrational coupling between isotope-edited amino acids in protein dimers. Depending on the presence and magnitude of coupling between C-13(alpha)=O peptide bond oscillators, characteristic level splittings of vibrational eigenstates are predicted. For the example of the Gramicidin A ion channel polypeptide, we observe typical IR fingerprints for the head-to-head and the antiparallel double-helical conformation of the dimer. We suggest that these findings can be used to clearly identify the structure of polypeptide aggregates using a particularly simple isotope substitution pattern.