Hydrogen bonds in crystalline D-alanine: diffraction and spectroscopic
evidence for differences between enantiomers
IUCRJ, 5 (1):
6-12 (2018)DOI: 10.1107/S2052252517015573
Abstract
Enantiomeric amino acids have specific physiological functions in
complex biological systems. Systematic studies focusing on the
solid-state properties of D-amino acids are, however, still limited. To
shed light on this field, structural and spectroscopic studies of
D-alanine using neutron powder diffraction, polarized Raman scattering
and ab initio calculations of harmonic vibrational frequencies were
carried out. Clear changes in the number of vibrational modes are
observed as a function of temperature, which can be directly connected
to variations of the N-D bond lengths. These results reveal
dissimilarities in the structural properties of D-alanine compared with
L-alanine.