Structural and dynamical analysis of the hydration of the Alzheimer's beta-amyloid peptide

An analysis of the water molecules in the first solvation shell obtained from the molecular dynamics simulation of the amyloid beta(10-35)NH2 peptide and the amyloid beta(10-35)NH2E22Q "Dutch" mutant peptide is presented. The structure, energetics, and dynamics of water in the hydration shell have been investigated using a variety of measures, including the hydrogen bond network, the water residence times for all the peptide residues, the diffusion constant, experimentally determined HN amide proton exchange, and the transition probabilities for water to move from one residue to another or into the bulk. The results of the study indicate that: (1) the water molecules at the peptide-solvent interface are organized in an ordered structure similar for the two peptide systems but different from that of the bulk, (2) the peptide structure inhibits diffusion perpendicular to the peptide surface by a factor of 3 to 5 relative to diffusion parallel to the peptide surface, which is comparable to diffusion of bulk water, (3) water in the first solvation shell shows dynamical relaxation on fast (1-2 ps) and slow (10-40 ps) time scales, (4) a novel solvent relaxation master equation is shown to capture the details of the fast relaxation of water in the peptide's first solvation shell, (5) the interaction between the peptide and the solvent is stronger in the wild type than in the E22Q mutant peptide, in agreement with earlier results obtained from computer simulations [Massi, F.; Straub, J. E. Biophys J 2001, 81, 697] correlated with the observed enhanced activity of the E22Q mutant peptide.