Recent progresses in understanding of water interacting with biomolecules, and inside living cells and tissues

Abstract

Recent inelastic and quasi-elastic neutron scattering measurements of water in cell preparations has provided information on the interfacial (or bound) water molecules. The experiments show that the interfacial water molecules can be readily distinguished from those in the bulk (bulk water), especially using inelastic neutron scattering data over the 20-130 meV range. Studies of intact biological systems - whole cells and tissues - demonstrated the feasibility of using these methods to assess the degree of interfacial water and their potential for monitoring physiological changes. Here we also describe the effect of heat shock and osmotic stress on yeast and E. coli cells, and show that the interfacial water content increases with elevated osmolarity and heat shock, and decreases under hypoosmotic conditions.KeywordsNeutron scatteringwaterinterfacial watercellsbiomolecules