Structural Stability of Peptidic His-Containing Proton Wire in Solution and in the Adsorbed State

Molecular wires are functional molecules applicable in the field of transfer processes in technological and biochemical applications. Besides molecular wires with the ability to transfer electrons, research is currently focused on molecular wires with high proton affinity and proton transfer ability. Recently, proposed peptidic proton wires (H wires) are one example. Their ability to mediate the transport of protons from aqueous solutions onto the surface of a Hg electrode in a catalytic hydrogen evolution reaction was investigated by constant-current chronopotentiometric stripping. However, elucidating the structure of H wires and rationalizing their stability are key requirements for their further research and application. In this article, we focus on the His (H) and Ala (A)-containing peptidic H wire A₃-(H-A₂)₆ in solution and after its immobilization onto the electrode surface in the presence of the secondary structure stabilizer 2,2,2-trifluoroethanol (TFE). We found that the solvent containing more than 25% of TFE stabilizes the helical structure of A₃-(H-A₂)₆ not only in solution but also in the adsorbed state. The TFE efficacy to stabilize α-helical structure was confirmed using high-resolution nuclear magnetic resonance, circular dichroism, and molecular dynamics simulation. Experimental and theoretical results indicated A₃-(H-A₂)₆ to be a high proton-affinity peptidic H wire with an α-helical structure stabilized by TFE, which was confirmed in a comparative study with hexahistidine as an example of a peptide with a definitely disordered and random coil structure. The results presented here could be used for further investigation of the peptidic H wires and for the application of electrochemical methods in the research of proton transfer phenomena in general.