A combined variable temperature 600 MHz NMR/MD study of the calcium release agent cyclic adenosine diphosphate ribose (cADPR): Structure, conformational analysis, and thermodynamics of the conformational equilibria.

A combined variable temperature 600 MHz NMR/molecular dynamics study of the Ca2+-release agent cyclic adenosine 5′-diphosphate ribose (cADPR) was conducted. In addition to elucidating the major and minor orientations of the conformationally flexible furanose rings, γ– (C4′–C5′), and β– (C5′–O5′) bonds, the thermodynamics (ΔHo, ΔSo) associated with each of these conformational equilibria were determined. Both furanose rings were biased towards a south conformation (64–74%) and both β–bonds heavily favored trans conformations. The R-ring γ–bond was found to exist almost exclusively as the γ+ conformer, whereas the A-ring γ–bond was a mixture of the γ+ and γt conformers, with the trans conformer being slightly favored. Enthalpic factors accounted for most of the observed conformational preferences, although the R-ring furanose exists as its major conformation based solely on entropic factors. There was excellent agreement between the NMR and MD results, particularly with regard to the conformer identities, but the MD showed a bias towards γ+ conformers. The MD results showed that both N-glycosidic χ–bonds are exclusively syn. Collectively the data allowed for the construction of a model for cADPR in which many of the conformationally flexible units in fact effectively adopt single orientations and where most of the conformational diversity resides in its A-ring furanose and γ–bond.