NMR of Amino Acids, Peptides, and Proteins (1977–1979)

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the history of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) of amino acids, peptides, and proteins. Biological NMR technique is a very powerful one and has demonstrated its ability to elucidate the structures of smaller molecules to the extent that its use is essential for most organic chemists, but when applied to biological macromolecules it becomes subject to three major disadvantages that is described in the chapter. This chapter illustrates that overcoming the problems of resolution and assignment is thus a necessary feature of any NMR approach to macromolecules and it is true to say that many papers that reach the literature are reports of work that never really succeeded in overcoming both. This chapter briefly discusses the chief methods used in overcoming the resolution problem. This problem is most marked in proton spectroscopy; the much larger chemical shift range found, for example, in C spectra shifts the main problem from resolution to assignment and signal-to-noise ratio.