Detection of a transient intramolecular hydrogen bond using 1JNH scalar couplings

Abstract

Hydrogen bonds are essential for the structure, stability and folding of proteins. The identification of intramolecular hydrogen bonds, however, is challenging, in particular in transiently folded states. Here we studied the presence of intramolecular hydrogen bonds in the folding nucleus of the coiled-coil structure of the GCN4 leucine zipper. Using one-bond 1JNH spin–spin coupling constants and hydrogen/deuterium exchange, we demonstrate that a transient intramolecular hydrogen bond is present in the partially helical folding nucleus of GCN(16–31). The data demonstrate that 1JNH couplings are a sensitive tool for the detection of transient intramolecular hydrogen bonds in challenging systems where the effective/useable protein concentration is low. This includes peptides at natural abundance but also uniformly labeled biomolecules that are limited to low concentrations because of precipitation or aggregation.