Chlorine-35/37 NMR spectroscopy of solid amino acid hydrochlorides: refinement of hydrogen-bonded proton positions using experiment and theory.

Trends in the chlorine chemical shift (CS) tensors of amino acid hydrochlorides are investigated in the context of new data obtained at 21.1 T and extensive quantum chemical calculations. The analysis of chlorine-35/37 NMR spectra of solid L-tryptophan hydrochloride obtained at two magnetic field strengths yields the chlorine electric field gradient (EFG) and CS tensors, and their relative orientations. The chlorine CS tensor is also determined for the first time for DL-arginine hydrochloride monohydrate. The drastic influence of 1H decoupling at 21.1 T on the spectral features of salts with particularly small 35Cl quadrupolar coupling constants (CQ) is demonstrated. The chlorine CS tensor spans (Omega) of hydrochloride salts of hydrophobic amino acids are found to be larger than those for salts of hydrophilic amino acids. A new combined experimental-theoretical procedure is described in which quantum chemical geometry optimizations of hydrogen-bonded proton positions around the chloride ions in a series of amino acid hydrochlorides are cross-validated against the experimental chlorine EFG and CS tensor data. The conclusion is reached that the relatively computationally inexpensive B3LYP/3-21G* method provides proton positions which are suitable for subsequent higher-level calculations of the chlorine EFG tensors. The computed value of is less sensitive to the proton positions. Following this cross-validation procedure, /CQ(35Cl)/ is generally predicted within 15% of the experimental value for a range of HCl salts. The results suggest the applicability of chlorine NMR interaction tensors in the refinement of proton positions in structurally similar compounds, e.g., chloride ion channels, for which neutron diffraction data are unavailable.