Abstract
In this paper, we examined the competence of amino acids as standards for instrumental biochemical analysis. The chosen amino acids were first dissolved in various aquatic solutions and then measured in a benchtop NMR spectrometer, which is not a common choice in such analytical investigations. Analysis by mass spectrometry was used in addition. As part of these investigations, we examined and determined the stability of the amino acids ornithine, glutamic acid, alanine, glycine, proline, pyroglutamic acid, phenylalanine and trans-4-hydroxy-D-proline under critical basic and acidic pH conditions and under various other conditions. We observed that not all solutions of the amino acid standards remain stable under the given conditions and a chemical transformation takes place. Given our findings by mass spectroscopy, additional kinetic measurements were carried out with the benchtop NMR spectrometer. We discovered that pyroglutamic acid becomes unstable under basic conditions and decarboxylates to pyrrolidone.
Highlights
Amino acids describe the vast, complex and diverse group of molecules that include both an amino and a carboxyl group (Lu and Freeland 2016)
The standard alphabet consists of 20 amino acids abbreviated into a three letter or one letter code, which is intended to reduce the size of the data files needed to describe the sequence of the amino acids within a protein
We present the investigation of amino acids and amino acid standards regarding their stability in extreme conditions
Summary
Amino acids describe the vast, complex and diverse group of molecules that include both an amino and a carboxyl group (Lu and Freeland 2016). They are the building blocks of proteins and can be considered the most important structures in the creation and proper function of life itself. It was discovered that not all prebiotically synthesized amino acids ended up in the standard alphabet and that not all structures of the standard alphabet could have been prebiotically synthesized. The analysis of those structures, free amino acids and proteins plays an important role in today’s chemistry and biochemistry as well as in various other fields.
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