AN INVESTIGATION OF BIOLOGICAL SYSTEMS BY SLOW NEUTRON INELASTIC SCATTERING.

Abstract

Several systems of biological interest have been investigated by slow neutron inelastic scattering. The frequencies of molecular vibrations in a 40-800/cm range have been obtained for several polypeptides (polyglutamic acid (PGA), polyglycine, polyleucine). Under certain approximations, the frequency distribution g(mu) of phonons in the sample can be extracted from the scattered neutron intensity. This function g(mu) can in turn be used to calculate some of the thermodynamic parameters such as free energy, enthalpy, or specific heat. This has been applied to the study of the alpha-helix-random coil transition in PGA, and to the denaturation of bovine serum albumun (BSA). Preliminary results on the 'melting' of keratin structure in 7-8 LiBr solution are also presented. (Author)

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Sep 01, 1966
Accession Number
AD0638991

Entities

People

  • H. P. Boutin

Organizations

  • Picatinny Arsenal

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Free Energy
  • Frequency
  • Inelastic Scattering
  • Neutrons
  • Peptides
  • Scattering
  • Specific Heat
  • Systems Biology
  • Thermal Neutrons

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Materials Science and Engineering.
  • Molecular and Cellular Biochemistry
  • Spectroscopy.