Membrane-Bound Conformation of Peptaibols with Methyl-Deuterated α-Amino Isobutyric Acids by 2H Magic Angle Spinning Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy

We present the use of 2H magic-angle spinning (MAS) NMR on methyl-deuterated α-amino isobutyric acid (Aib) as a new method to obtain fast and accurate structural constraints on peptaibols in membrane-bound environments. Using nonoriented vesicle-reconstituted samples we avoid the delicate preparation of oriented samples, and the use of MAS ensures high sensitivity and thereby very fast acquisition of experimental spectra. Furthermore, given the high content (∼40%) of Aib in peptaibols and the fact that the amino acid Aib may be synthesized from cheap starting materials, even in the case of 2H, 13C, or 15N labeling, this method is ideally suited for studies of the membrane-bound conformation of peptaibols.