Unfolding Dynamics of a Photoswitchable Helical Peptide

We present an atomistic force field for the azo-moiety of the photoswitchable FK-11-X peptide. We use the parameters to study the unfolding of the peptide through molecular dynamics simulations. The unfolded ensemble contains many different structures, ranging from a partially unfolded peptide to a fully unfolded structure. The averaged computed far-ultraviolet circular dichroism (CD) spectrum of the set of structures, which was simulated using the newly developed force field, agrees well with experiment. The rate of the simulated unfolding process was estimated to have a time constant of 5.80 ± 0.03 ns from the time evolution of the CD spectrum of the peptide, computed from the backbone conformations sampled over 40 simulated trajectories. Our estimated time constant is faster than, but not inconsistent with, previous experimental estimates from time-resolved infrared and optical rotatory dispersion spectroscopy.