In nano-confinements, aqueous solutions can be found to remain in a liquid state at subfreezing temperatures. The finding provides a means of entering into previously inaccessible temperature regions for studying the dynamics and structure of bulk liquid. Here we show that studying biomolecular structures in nano-confinements improves the accuracy of cryostructures and provides better insight into the relationship between hydration water and biomolecules. Synthetic prion protein peptides are studied in two experimental conditions: (i) in confined nanochannels within mesoporous materials, and (ii) in vitrified bulk solvents, with a temperature range of 50-275 K, using cw/pulse ESR techniques. A large inhomogeneous lineshape broadening is only observed for the spectra from the vitrified bulk solvent below 70 K, suggesting a possible peptide clustering in the solution. The spin-counting and distance measurements by DEER-ESR provide further evidence that peptides are dispersed homogeneously in mesopores but heterogeneously in vitrified solvents wherein the biomolecular structure is disturbed due to heterogeneity in the bulk solvent structure. Our study demonstrates that the nanospace within mesoporous materials provides an amorphous environment that is better than vitrified bulk solvent for studying biostructures at cryogenic temperatures.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 5. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 27 August 2011.
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#9,747,387
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Outputs from Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
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#499
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Altmetric has tracked 34,763,505 research outputs across all sources so far. This one has received more attention than most of these and is in the 70th percentile.
So far Altmetric has tracked 119,650 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 40.2. This one is in the 35th percentile – i.e., 35% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 840 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one is in the 38th percentile – i.e., 38% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.
