Selectively Enhanced 1H-1H Correlations in Proton-Detected Solid-State NMR under Ultrafast MAS Conditions

Selective correlations between aliphatic 13C nuclei in protein solid-state NMR

Solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a potent tool for studying the structures and dynamics of insoluble proteins. It starts with signal assignment through multi-dimensional correlation experiments, where the aliphatic 13Cα-13Cβ correlation is indispensable for identifying specific residues. However, developing efficient methods for achieving this correlation is a challenge in solid-state NMR. We present a simple band-selective zero-quantum (ZQ) recoupling method, named POST-C4161 (PC4), which enhances 13Cα-13Cβ correlations under moderate magic-angle spinning (MAS) conditions. PC4 requires minimal 13C radio-frequency (RF) field and proton decoupling, exhibits high stability against RF variations, and achieves superior efficiency. Comparative tests on various samples, including the formyl-Met-Leu-Phe (fMLF) tripeptide, microcrystalline β1 immunoglobulin binding domain of protein G (GB1), and membrane protein of mechanosensitive channel of large conductance from Methanosarcina acetivorans (MaMscL), demonstrate that PC4 selectively enhances 13Cα-13Cβ correlations by up to 50 % while suppressing unwanted correlations, as compared to the popular dipolar-assisted rotational resonance (DARR). It has addressed the long-standing need for selective 13C-13C correlation methods. We anticipate that this simple but efficient PC4 method will have immediate applications in structural biology by solid-state NMR.

Continuous Floquet theory in solid-state NMR

This article presents the application of continuous Floquet theory in solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). Continuous Floquet theory extends the traditional Floquet theory to non-continuous Hamiltonians, enabling the description of observable effects not fully captured by the traditional Floquet theory due to its requirement for a periodic Hamiltonian. We present closed-form expressions for computing first- and second-order effective Hamiltonians, streamlining integration with the traditional Floquet theory and facilitating application in NMR experiments featuring multiple modulation frequencies. Subsequently, we show examples of the practical application of continuous Floquet theory by investigating several solid-state NMR experiments. These examples illustrate the importance of the duration of the pulse scheme regarding the width of the resonance conditions and the near-resonance behavior.

Probing the Molecular and Macroscopic Structure of Solid Solutions by Dynamic Nuclear Polarization (DNP) Enhanced 13C and 15N Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy

Crystallization is a widely used purification technique in the manufacture of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) and precursor molecules. However, when impurities and desired compounds have similar molecular structures, separation by crystallization may become challenging. In such cases, some impurities may form crystalline solid solutions with the desired product during recrystallization. Understanding the molecular structure of these recrystallized solid solutions is crucial to devise methods for effective purification. Unfortunately, there are limited analytical techniques that provide insights into the molecular structure or spatial distribution of impurities that are incorporated within recrystallized products. In this study, we investigated model solid solutions formed by recrystallizing salicylic acid (SA) in the presence of anthranilic acid (AA). These two molecules are known to form crystalline solid solutions due to their similar molecular structures. To overcome challenges associated with the long 1H longitudinal relaxation times (T1(1H)) of SA and AA, we employed dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP) and 15N isotope enrichment to enable solid-state NMR experiments. Results of solid-state NMR experiments and DFT calculations revealed that SA and AA are homogeneously alloyed as a solid solution. Heteronuclear correlation (HETCOR) experiments and plane-wave DFT structural models provide further evidence of the molecular-level interactions between SA and AA. This research provides valuable insights into the molecular structure of recrystallized solid solutions, contributing to the development of effective purification strategies and an understanding of the physicochemical properties of solid solutions.

Using Abundant 1H Polarization to Enhance the Sensitivity of Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy

Solid-state NMR spectroscopy has been playing a significant role in elucidating the structures and dynamics of materials and proteins at the atomic level for decades. As an extremely abundant nucleus with a very high gyromagnetic ratio, protons are widely present in most organic/inorganic materials. Thus, this Perspective highlights the advantages of proton detection at fast magic-angle spinning (MAS) and presents strategies to utilize and exhaust 1H polarization to achieve signal sensitivity enhancement of solid-state NMR spectroscopy, enabling substantial time savings and extraction of more structural and dynamics information per unit time. Those strategies include developing sensitivity-enhanced single-channel 1H multidimensional NMR spectroscopy, implementing multiple polarization transfer steps in each scan to enhance low-γ nuclei signals, and making full use of 1H polarization to obtain homonuclear and heteronuclear chemical shift correlation spectra in a single experiment. Finally, outlooks and perspectives are provided regarding the challenges and future for the further development of sensitivity-enhanced proton-based solid-state NMR spectroscopy.

Solid-State NMR Double-Quantum Dipolar Recoupling Enhanced by Additional Phase Modulation

Additional phase modulation (APM) is proposed to generally enhance the theoretical efficiency of homonuclear double-quantum (DQ) recoupling in solid-state NMR. APM applies an additional phase list to DQ recoupling in steps of an entire block. The sine-based phase list can enhance the theoretical efficiency by 15-30 %, from 0.52 to 0.68 (non-γ-encoded recoupling) or from 0.73 to 0.84 (γ-encoded recoupling), with doubled recoupling time. The genetic-algorithm (GA) optimized APM can adiabatically enhance the efficiency to ∼1.0 at longer times. The concept of APM has been tested on SPR-51 , BaBa, and SPR-31 , which represent γ-encoded recoupling, non-γ-encoded recoupling, and another kind beyond the former two, respectively. Simulations reveal that enhancements from APM are due to the activation of more crystallites in the powder. Experiments on 2,3-13 C labeled alanine are used to validate the APM recoupling. This new concept shall shed light on developing more efficient homonuclear recoupling methods.

Great Offset Difference Internuclear Selective Transfer

Carbon-carbon dipolar recoupling sequences are frequently used building blocks in routine magic-angle spinning NMR experiments. While broadband homonuclear first-order dipolar recoupling sequences mainly excite intra-residue correlations, selective methods can detect inter-residue transfers and long-range correlations. Here, we present the great offset difference internuclear selective transfer (GODIST) pulse sequence optimized for selective carbonyl or aliphatic recoupling at fast magic-angle spinning, here, 55 kHz. We observe a 3- to 5-fold increase in intensities compared with broadband RFDR recoupling for perdeuterated microcrystalline SH3 and for the membrane protein influenza A M2 in lipid bilayers. In 3D (H)COCO(N)H and (H)CO(CO)NH spectra, inter-residue carbonyl-carbonyl correlations up to about 5 Å are observed in uniformly 13C-labeled proteins.

Ultrafast Magic Angle Spinning Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy: Advances in Methodology and Applications

Solid-state NMR spectroscopy is one of the most commonly used techniques to study the atomic-resolution structure and dynamics of various chemical, biological, material, and pharmaceutical systems spanning multiple forms, including crystalline, liquid crystalline, fibrous, and amorphous states. Despite the unique advantages of solid-state NMR spectroscopy, its poor spectral resolution and sensitivity have severely limited the scope of this technique. Fortunately, the recent developments in probe technology that mechanically rotate the sample fast (100 kHz and above) to obtain "solution-like" NMR spectra of solids with higher resolution and sensitivity have opened numerous avenues for the development of novel NMR techniques and their applications to study a plethora of solids including globular and membrane-associated proteins, self-assembled protein aggregates such as amyloid fibers, RNA, viral assemblies, polymorphic pharmaceuticals, metal-organic framework, bone materials, and inorganic materials. While the ultrafast-MAS continues to be developed, the minute sample quantity and radio frequency requirements, shorter recycle delays enabling fast data acquisition, the feasibility of employing proton detection, enhancement in proton spectral resolution and polarization transfer efficiency, and high sensitivity per unit sample are some of the remarkable benefits of the ultrafast-MAS technology as demonstrated by the reported studies in the literature. Although the very low sample volume and very high RF power could be limitations for some of the systems, the advantages have spurred solid-state NMR investigation into increasingly complex biological and material systems. As ultrafast-MAS NMR techniques are increasingly used in multidisciplinary research areas, further development of instrumentation, probes, and advanced methods are pursued in parallel to overcome the limitations and challenges for widespread applications. This review article is focused on providing timely comprehensive coverage of the major developments on instrumentation, theory, techniques, applications, limitations, and future scope of ultrafast-MAS technology.

Multiple acquisitions in a single scan: exhausting abundant 1H polarization at fast MAS

Proton-detected solid-state NMR spectroscopy is emerging as a unique tool for atomic characterization of organic solids due to the boost of resolution and sensitivity afforded by the combined use of high magnetic field and ultrafast magic angle spinning (MAS). Here, we proposed a new set of proton-detected solid-state NMR sequences that hybrid multi-dimensional ¹H-¹H homonuclear chemical shift correlation (HOMCOR) and two-dimensional ¹H-¹³C heteronuclear chemical shift correlation (HETCOR) sequences into a single experiment, enabling the simultaneous acquisition of multidimensional HOMCOR and HETCOR spectra and thus significant time savings. Based on the core idea of exhausting ¹H polarization in each transient scan, we firstly demonstrated that 3D ¹H multiple-quantum (MQ) HOMCOR sequence can be combined with 2D HETCOR sequence into a single experiment, leading to the simultaneous acquisition of a 3D ¹H MQ HOMCOR and a 2D ¹H-¹³C HETCOR spectrum. Besides, we also showed that 2D ¹H/¹H double-quantum/single-quantum (DQ/SQ) and single-quantum/single-quantum (SQ/SQ) HOMCOR sequence can be simultaneously combined with HETCOR sequence either, and thus three spectra can be simultaneously obtained from one experiment, including 2D ¹H DQ/SQ, 2D ¹H SQ/SQ and 2D ¹H-¹³C HETCOR spectra. Since there is only one recycle delay in each experiment, experimental time is substantially reduced compared to separate acquisition of each multi-dimensional solid-state NMR spectrum. Furthermore, those new sequences can be implemented on any standard solid-state spectrometer with only one receiver. Thus, we foresee that these approaches can be valuable for the study of a broad range of molecular systems, including polymers, pharmaceuticals, covalent-organic frameworks (COF) and so on.

Ultrafast magic angle spinning NMR characterization of pharmaceutical solid polymorphism: A posaconazole example

Protons represent the most NMR-sensitive nucleus in pharmaceutical compounds. Therefore, proton-detected solid-state NMR techniques under fast magic angle spinning are among the few solutions to overcome the challenge of low sensitivity to analyze natural abundant drug substances and products. In this study, we report the structural characterization of crystal polymorphs of a commercial drug molecule, posaconazole, with a relatively large molecular weight of 700.8 g·mol^-1 and at the natural abundance. The enhanced sensitivity and resolution at 100 kHz MAS enables the exploration of the distinct intermolecular packing in posaconazole forms I, III, and γ. These results demonstrate that proton-detected homo- and heteronuclear correlation methods can probe the structural details of pharmaceutical polymorphism.

Assignment of aromatic side-chain spins and characterization of their distance restraints at fast MAS

The assignment of aromatic side-chain spins has always been more challenging than assigning backbone and aliphatic spins. Selective labeling combined with mutagenesis has been the approach for assigning aromatic spins. This manuscript reports a method for assigning aromatic spins in a fully protonated protein by connecting them to the backbone atoms using a low-power TOBSY sequence. The pulse sequence employs residual polarization and sequential acquisitions techniques to record HN- and HC-detected spectra in a single experiment. The unambiguous assignment of aromatic spins also enables the characterization of 1H-1H distance restraints involving aromatic spins. Broadband (RFDR) and selective (BASS-SD) recoupling sequences were used to generate HN-ΗC, HC-HN and HC-HC restraints involving the side-chain proton spins of aromatic residues. This approach has been demonstrated on a fully protonated U-[13C,15N] labeled GB1 sample at 95-100 kHz MAS.

Interaction frames in solid-state NMR: A case study for chemical-shift-selective irradiation schemes

Interaction frames play an important role in describing and understanding experimental schemes in magnetic resonance. They are often used to eliminate dominating parts of the spin Hamiltonian, e.g., the Zeeman Hamiltonian in the usual (Zeeman) rotating frame, or the radio-frequency-field (rf) Hamiltonian to describe the efficiency of decoupling or recoupling sequences. Going into an interaction frame can also make parts of a time-dependent Hamiltonian time independent like the rf-field Hamiltonian in the usual (Zeeman) rotating frame. Eliminating the dominant term often allows a better understanding of the details of the spin dynamics. Going into an interaction frame can also reduces the energy-level splitting in the Hamiltonian leading to a faster convergence of perturbation expansions, average Hamiltonian, or Floquet theory. Often, there is no obvious choice of the interaction frame to use but some can be more convenient than others. Using the example of frequency-selective dipolar recoupling, we discuss the differences, advantages, and disadvantages of different choices of interaction frames. They always include the complete radio-frequency Hamiltonian but can also contain the chemical shifts of the spins and may or may not contain the effective fields over one cycle of the pulse sequence.

Optimisation of 1H PMLG homonuclear decoupling at 60 kHz MAS to enable 15N-1H through-bond heteronuclear correlation solid-state NMR spectroscopy

The Lee-Goldburg condition for homonuclear decoupling in 1H magic-angle spinning (MAS) solid-state NMR sets the angle θ, corresponding to arctan of the ratio of the rf nutation frequency, ν1, to the rf offset, to be the magic angle, θm, equal to tan-1(√2) = 54.7°. At 60 kHz MAS, we report enhanced decoupling compared to MAS alone in a 1H spectrum of 15N-glycine with at θ = 30° for a ν1 of ∼100 kHz at a 1H Larmor frequency, ν0, of 500 MHz and 1 GHz, corresponding to a high chemical shift scaling factor (λCS) of 0.82. At 1 GHz, we also demonstrate enhanced decoupling compared to 60 kHz MAS alone for a lower ν1 of 51 kHz, i.e., a case where the nutation frequency is less than the MAS frequency, with θ = 18°, λCS = 0.92. The ratio of the rotor period to the decoupling cycle time, Ψ = τr/τc, is in the range 0.53 to 0.61. Windowed decoupling using the optimised parameters for a ν1 of ∼100 kHz also gives good performance in a 1H spin-echo experiment, enabling implementation in a 1H-detected 15N-1H cross polarisation (CP)-refocused INEPT heteronuclear correlation NMR experiment. Specifically, initial 15N transverse magnetisation as generated by 1H-15N CP is transferred back to 1H using a refocused INEPT pulse sequence employing windowed 1H decoupling. Such an approach ensures the observation of through-bond N-H connectivities. For 15N-glycine, while the CP-refocused INEPT experiment has a lower sensitivity (∼50%) as compared to a double CP experiment (with a 200 μs 15N to 1H CP contact time), there is selectivity for the directly bonded NH3+ moiety, while intensity is observed for the CH21H resonances in the double CP experiment. Two-dimensional 15N-1H correlation MAS NMR spectra are presented for the dipeptide β-AspAla and the pharmaceutical cimetidine at 60 kHz MAS, both at natural isotopic abundance. For the dipeptide β-AspAla, different build-up dependence on the first spin-echo duration is observed for the NH and NH3+ moieties demonstrating that the experiment could be used to distinguish resonances for different NHx groups.

Selective Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Method for Enhancing Long-Range Heteronuclear Correlations in Solids

The long-range heteronuclear correlation remains a significant challenge in solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), which is critical in the structural elucidation of biomolecular, material, and pharmaceutical solids. We propose a selective NMR method, heteronuclear selective phase-optimized recoupling (hetSPR), to selectively enhance long-range correlations of interest by utilizing characteristic chemical shifts. Compared to conventional methods, hetSPR can selectively enhance desired heteronuclear correlations (e.g., ¹H-¹³C and ¹H-¹⁹F) by factors up to 5 and largely suppress the unwanted ones. The method proves useful by enhancing the long-range correlation from an intermolecular ¹H-¹⁹F distance of 4.8 Å by a factor of 2.4 in a fluorinated pharmaceutical drug, bicalutamide, under fast magic-angle spinning. It does not use selective pulses and is thus user-friendly even for nonexperts. The new method is expected to boost solid-state NMR to elucidate the structures of various solids.

Mechanism of selective polarization exchange amongst chemically similar and distinct protons during weak rf irradiation at fast magic angle spinning

Band Selective Spectral Spin-Diffusion (BASS-SD) is a method to obtain selective ¹H-¹H contacts between chemically similar protons within a distance range of 5-6 Å in fully protonated proteins. BASS-SD combines low-amplitude proton spinlock radio frequency (rf) pulses with fast MAS frequency to enable selective polarization exchange in fully protonated molecules. The selectivity of transfer is dictated by the bandwidth of the spinlock pulse and has been used to observe selective H^N-H^N, H^α-Η^α and H^methyl-H^methyl correlations. These proton-proton spatial contacts are similar to those observed in perdeuterated samples and serve as useful structural restraints towards de novo protein structure determination. This study employs bimodal Floquet theory to derive the first- and second-order effective Hamiltonians necessary to understand the spin dynamics during BASS-SD. Analytical calculations combined with numerical simulations delineate two different mechanisms for polarization transfer amongst the proton spins. The BASS-SD recoupling condition has been reoptimized to observe selective correlations between chemically different protons (e.g., H^N-H^α) while retaining the spatial contacts between chemically similar protons (e.g., H^N-H^N). The new BASS-SD condition is integrated with simultaneous and sequential acquisition approaches to generate four different types of structural restraints (H^N-H^N, H^α-Η^α, H^N-H^α, H^α-H^N) in one experiment. The approach has been demonstrated on microcrystalline U-[¹³C,¹⁵N] labeled GB1 protein at ∼ 95-100 kHz MAS.

1H-Detected Biomolecular NMR under Fast Magic-Angle Spinning

Since the first pioneering studies on small deuterated peptides dating more than 20 years ago, 1H detection has evolved into the most efficient approach for investigation of biomolecular structure, dynamics, and interactions by solid-state NMR. The development of faster and faster magic-angle spinning (MAS) rates (up to 150 kHz today) at ultrahigh magnetic fields has triggered a real revolution in the field. This new spinning regime reduces the 1H-1H dipolar couplings, so that a direct detection of 1H signals, for long impossible without proton dilution, has become possible at high resolution. The switch from the traditional MAS NMR approaches with 13C and 15N detection to 1H boosts the signal by more than an order of magnitude, accelerating the site-specific analysis and opening the way to more complex immobilized biological systems of higher molecular weight and available in limited amounts. This paper reviews the concepts underlying this recent leap forward in sensitivity and resolution, presents a detailed description of the experimental aspects of acquisition of multidimensional correlation spectra with fast MAS, and summarizes the most successful strategies for the assignment of the resonances and for the elucidation of protein structure and conformational dynamics. It finally outlines the many examples where 1H-detected MAS NMR has contributed to the detailed characterization of a variety of crystalline and noncrystalline biomolecular targets involved in biological processes ranging from catalysis through drug binding, viral infectivity, amyloid fibril formation, to transport across lipid membranes.

Solid-State NMR: Methods for Biological Solids

In the last two decades, solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (ssNMR) spectroscopy has transformed from a spectroscopic technique investigating small molecules and industrial polymers to a potent tool decrypting structure and underlying dynamics of complex biological systems, such as membrane proteins, fibrils, and assemblies, in near-physiological environments and temperatures. This transformation can be ascribed to improvements in hardware design, sample preparation, pulsed methods, isotope labeling strategies, resolution, and sensitivity. The fundamental engagement between nuclear spins and radio-frequency pulses in the presence of a strong static magnetic field is identical between solution and ssNMR, but the experimental procedures vastly differ because of the absence of molecular tumbling in solids. This review discusses routinely employed state-of-the-art static and MAS pulsed NMR methods relevant for biological samples with rotational correlation times exceeding 100's of nanoseconds. Recent developments in signal filtering approaches, proton methodologies, and multiple acquisition techniques to boost sensitivity and speed up data acquisition at fast MAS are also discussed. Several examples of protein structures (globular, membrane, fibrils, and assemblies) solved with ssNMR spectroscopy have been considered. We also discuss integrated approaches to structurally characterize challenging biological systems and some newly emanating subdisciplines in ssNMR spectroscopy.

Modest Offset Difference Internuclear Selective Transfer via Homonuclear Dipolar Coupling

Homonuclear dipolar recoupling is routinely used for magic-angle spinning NMR-based structure determination. In fully protonated samples, only short proton-proton distances are accessible to broadband recoupling approaches because of high proton density. Selective methods allow detection of longer distances by directing polarization to a subset of spins. Here we introduce the selective pulse sequence MODIST, which recouples spins that have a modest chemical shift offset difference, and demonstrate it to selectively record correlations between amide protons. The sequence was selected for good retention of total signal, leading to up to twice the intensity for proton-proton correlations compared with other selective methods. The sequence is effective across a range of spinning conditions and magnetic fields, here tested at 55.555 and 100 kHz magic-angle spinning and at proton Larmor frequencies from 600 to 1200 MHz. For influenza A M2 in lipid bilayers, cross-peaks characteristic of a helical conformation are observed.

Application of solid-state NMR techniques for structural characterization of metal-organic frameworks

Solid-state NMR can afford the structural information about the chemical composition, local environment, and spatial coordination at the atomic level, which has been extensively applied to characterize the detailed structure and host-guest interactions in metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). In this review, recent advances for the structural characterizations of MOFs using versatile solid-state NMR techniques were briefly introduced. High-field sensitivity-enhanced solid-state NMR method enabled the direct observation of metal centers in MOFs containing low-γ nuclei. Two-dimensional (2D) homo- and hetero-nuclear correlation MAS NMR experiments provided the spatial proximity among linkers, metal clusters and the introduced guest molecules. Moreover, quantitative measurement of inter-nuclear distances using solid-state NMR provided valuable structural information about the connectivity geometry as well as the host-guest interactions within MOFs. Furthermore, solid-state NMR has exhibited great potential for unraveling the structure property of MOFs containing paramagnetic metal centers.

Separating an overlapped 1H peak and identifying its 1H-1H correlations with the use of single-channel 1H solid-state NMR at fast MAS

Fast magic-angle spinning (≥60 ​kHz) technique has enabled the acquisition of high-resolution ¹H NMR spectra of solid materials. However, the spectral interpretation is still difficult because the ¹H peaks are overlapped due to the narrow chemical shift range and broad linewidths. An additional ¹³C or ¹⁴N or ¹H dimension possibly addresses the issues of overlapped proton resonances, but it leads to the elongated experimental time. Herein, we introduce a single-channel ¹H experiment to separate the overlapped ¹H peak and identify its spatially proximal ¹H-¹H correlations. This sequence combines selective excitation, selective ¹H-¹H polarization transfer by selective recoupling of protons (SERP), and broadband ¹H recoupling by back-to-back (BABA) recoupling sequences. The concept for ¹H separation is based on (i) the selective excitation of a well-resolved ¹H peak and (ii) the selective dipolar polarization transfer from this isolated ¹H peak to one of the ¹H peaks in the overlapped/poor resolution region by SERP and (iii) the detection of ¹H-¹H correlations from these two ¹H peaks to other neighboring ¹Hs by BABA. We demonstrated the applicability of this approach to identify overlapped peaks on two molecules, β-L-aspartyl-l-alanine and Pioglitazone.HCl. The sequence allows the clear observation of ¹H-¹H correlations from an overlapped ¹H peak without an additional heteronuclear dimension and ensures efficient polarization transfers that leads to twelve fold reduction in experimental time compared to ¹⁴N edited experiments. The limitation and the conditions of applicability for this approach are discussed in detail.

Solid-State NMR Dipolar and Chemical Shift Anisotropy Recoupling Techniques for Structural and Dynamical Studies in Biological Systems

With the development of NMR methodology and technology during the past decades, solid-state NMR (ssNMR) has become a particularly important tool for investigating structure and dynamics at atomic scale in biological systems, where the recoupling techniques play pivotal roles in modern high-resolution MAS NMR. In this review, following a brief introduction on the basic theory of recoupling in ssNMR, we highlight the recent advances in dipolar and chemical shift anisotropy recoupling methods, as well as their applications in structural determination and dynamical characterization at multiple time scales (i.e., fast-, intermediate-, and slow-motion). The performances of these prevalent recoupling techniques are compared and discussed in multiple aspects, together with the representative applications in biomolecules. Given the recent emerging advances in NMR technology, new challenges for recoupling methodology development and potential opportunities for biological systems are also discussed.

Rapid Structural Analysis of Minute Quantities of Organic Solids by Exhausting 1H Polarization in Solid-State NMR Spectroscopy Under Fast Magic Angle Spinning

Solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) often suffers from significant limitations due to the inherent low signal sensitivity when low-γ nuclei are involved. Herein, we report an elegant solid-state NMR approach for rapid structural analysis of minute amounts of organic solids. By encoding staggered chemical shift evolution in the indirect dimension and staggered acquisition in the ¹H dimension, a proton-detected homonuclear ¹H/¹H and heteronuclear ¹³C/¹H chemical shift correlation (HETCOR) spectrum can be obtained simultaneously in a single experiment at a fast magic-angle-spinning (MAS) condition with barely increasing the experimental time. We further show that during the conventional ¹H-detected HETCOR experimental time, multiple homonuclear ¹H/¹H correlation spectra can be recorded in addition to the HETCOR spectrum, enabling the determination of ¹H-¹H distances. We establish that abundant ¹H polarization can be efficiently manipulated and fully utilized in proton-detected solid-state NMR spectroscopy for extraction of more critical structural information and thus reduction of the total experimental time.

Simultaneous determination of multiple coupling networks by high-resolution 2D J-edited NMR spectroscopy

J coupling constitutes an important NMR parameter for molecular-level composition analysis and conformation elucidation. Dozens of J-based approaches have been exploited for J coupling measurement and coupling network determination, however, they are generally imposed to insufficient spectral resolution to resolve crowded NMR resonances and low measurement efficiency that a single experiment records one J coupling network. Herein, we propose a general NMR method to collect high-resolution 2D J-edited NMR spectra, which are characterized with advantages of pure absorptive lineshapes, decoupled chemical shift dimension, as well as eliminated axial peaks, thus facilitating J coupling partner assignments and J coupling constant measurements. More meaningfully, this protocol allows simultaneous determination of multiple coupling networks for highly efficient multiplet analyses via addressing multiple protons within one single experiment. Additionally, another variant is proposed for high-resolution applications under adverse magnetic field conditions. Therefore, this study provides a useful NMR protocol for configurational and structural studies with extensive applications in chemistry, biology, and material science.

Theory of frequency-selective homonuclear dipolar recoupling in solid-state NMR

In solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance, frequency-selective homonuclear dipolar recoupling is key to quantitative distance measurement or selective enhancement of correlations between atoms of interest in multiple-spin systems, which are not amenable to band-selective or broadband recoupling. Previous frequency-selective recoupling is mostly based on the so-called rotational resonance (R²) condition that restricts the application to spin pairs with resonance frequencies differing in integral multiples of the magic-angle spinning (MAS) frequency. Recently, we have proposed a series of frequency-selective homonuclear recoupling sequences called SPR (short for Selective Phase-optimized Recoupling), which have been successfully applied for selective ¹H-¹H or ¹³C-¹³C recoupling under from moderate (∼10 kHz) to ultra-fast (150 kHz) MAS frequencies. In this study, we fully analyze the average Hamiltonian theory of SPR sequences and reveal the origin of frequency selectivity in recoupling. The theoretical description, as well as numerical simulations and experiments, demonstrates that the frequency selectivity can be easily controlled by the flip angle (p) in the (p)_ϕk(p)_ϕk+π unit in the pSPR-N_n sequences. Small flip angles lead to frequency-selective recoupling, while large flip angles may lead to broadband recoupling in principle. The result shall shed new light on the design of homonuclear recoupling sequences with arbitrary frequency bandwidths.

From Angstroms to Nanometers: Measuring Interatomic Distances by Solid-State NMR

Internuclear distances represent one of the main structural constraints in molecular structure determination using solid-state NMR spectroscopy, complementing chemical shifts and orientational restraints. Although a large number of magic-angle-spinning (MAS) NMR techniques have been available for distance measurements, traditional ¹³C and ¹⁵N NMR experiments are inherently limited to distances of a few angstroms due to the low gyromagnetic ratios of these nuclei. Recent development of fast MAS triple-resonance ¹⁹F and ¹H NMR probes has stimulated the design of MAS NMR experiments that measure distances in the 1-2 nm range with high sensitivity. This review describes the principles and applications of these multiplexed multidimensional correlation distance NMR experiments, with an emphasis on ¹⁹F- and ¹H-based distance experiments. Representative applications of these long-distance NMR methods to biological macromolecules as well as small molecules are reviewed.

Selective 1H-1H recoupling via symmetry sequences in fully protonated samples at fast magic angle spinning

Proton-detected solid-state NMR at fast Magic Angle Spinning (MAS) is becoming the norm to characterize molecules. Routinely ¹H-¹H and ¹H-X dipolar couplings are used to characterize the structure and dynamics of molecules. Selective proton recoupling techniques are emerging as a method for structural characterization via estimation of qualitative and quantitative distances. In the present study, we demonstrate through numerical simulations and experiments that the well-characterized CN^v_n sequences can also be tailored for selective recoupling of proton spins by employing C elements of the type (β)_Φ(4β)_Φ+π(3β)_Φ. Herein, several CN^v_n sequences were examined through numerical simulations and experiments. C6¹₄ recoupling sequence with a modified POST-element ((β)_Φ(4β)_Φ+π(3β)_Φ) shows selective polarization transfer efficiencies on the order of 40-50% between various proton spin pairs in fully protonated samples at rf amplitudes ranging from 0.3 to 0.8 times the MAS frequency. These selective recoupling sequences have been labeled as frequency-selective-CN^v_n sequences. The extent of selectivity, polarization transfer efficiency and the feasibility of experimentally measuring proton-proton distances in fully protonated samples are explored here. The development of efficient and robust selective ¹H-¹H recoupling experiments is required to structurally characterize molecules without artificial isotope enrichment or the need for diffracting crystals.

Heteronuclear and homonuclear radio-frequency-driven recoupling

The radio-frequency-driven recoupling (RFDR) pulse sequence is used in magic-angle spinning (MAS) NMR to recouple homonuclear dipolar interactions. Here we show simultaneous recoupling of both the heteronuclear and homonuclear dipolar interactions by applying RFDR pulses on two channels. We demonstrate the method, called HETeronuclear RFDR (HET-RFDR), on microcrystalline SH3 samples at 10 and 55.555 kHz MAS. Numerical simulations of both HET-RFDR and standard RFDR sequences allow for better understanding of the influence of offsets and paths of magnetization transfers for both HET-RFDR and RFDR experiments, as well as the crucial role of XY phase cycling.

Spectral editing of alanine, serine, and threonine in uniformly labeled proteins based on frequency-selective homonuclear recoupling in solid-state NMR

Spectral editing is crucial to simplify the crowded solid-state NMR spectra of proteins. New techniques are introduced to edit ¹³C-¹³C correlations of uniformly labeled proteins under moderate magic-angle spinning (MAS), based on our recent frequency-selective homonuclear recoupling sequences [Zhang et al., J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 2020, 11, 8077-8083]. The signals of alanine, serine, or threonine residues are selected out by selective ¹³Cα-¹³Cβ double-quantum filtering (DQF). The ¹³Cα-¹³Cβ correlations of alanine residues are selectively established with efficiency up to ~ 1.8 times that by dipolar-assisted rotational resonance (DARR). The techniques are shown in 2D/3D NCCX experiments and applied to the uniformly ¹³C, ¹⁵N labeled Aquaporin Z (AqpZ) membrane protein, demonstrating their potential to simplify spectral analyses in biological solid-state NMR.

Solid-State NMR for Studying the Structure and Dynamics of Viral Assemblies

Structural virology reveals the architecture underlying infection. While notably electron microscopy images have provided an atomic view on viruses which profoundly changed our understanding of these assemblies incapable of independent life, spectroscopic techniques like NMR enter the field with their strengths in detailed conformational analysis and investigation of dynamic behavior. Typically, the large assemblies represented by viral particles fall in the regime of biological high-resolution solid-state NMR, able to follow with high sensitivity the path of the viral proteins through their interactions and maturation steps during the viral life cycle. We here trace the way from first solid-state NMR investigations to the state-of-the-art approaches currently developing, including applications focused on HIV, HBV, HCV and influenza, and an outlook to the possibilities opening in the coming years.