Hydration of bacterial lectin in native state and after immobilization on surface of hydrophobic silica

The aim of the work was to study the peculiarities of interaction of the surface of bacterial lectin of Bacillus subtilis IMB B-7724 inthe native state and under different model conditions with water molecules by 1 H NMR; to create a composite system based on the studied lectin, in which the protein molecule is minimally affected by the surface of the carrier, because protein molecules are capable to bind a significant amount of water localized in the spaces between the polymer chains. A method of “dry” immobilization of bacterial lectin on the surface of hydrophobic silica has been developed. Hydration of native lectin and lectin fixed on the surface of hydrophobic silica AM-1-175 was studied by low-temperature 1 H NMR spectroscopy. It has been shown that the immobilization of lectin on the surface of AM1 is accompanied by an increase in the interfacial energy gS from 4.1 to 5.2 J/g. This is due to an increase in the concentration of strongly bound water. Analysis of changes in the distributions of radii R of clusters of adsorbed water allows us to state that in water adsorbed by native lectin, there are two main maxima at R = 1 and 3 nm. In the immobilized state, the maximum at R = 1 nm is present in both types of water (of different order), but the second maximum is observed only for more ordered associates. Chloroform medium slightly reduces the binding energy of water to native lectin molecules (from 4.3 to 4.1 J/g), but in the case of immobilized lectin in CDCl3 medium, the value of ΣgS increases from 5.2 to 7.4 J/g. That is, the weakly polar medium promotes to increase in the interaction of water with interfaces, which is manifested in a relative increase in the number of water clusters of smaller size (Fig. 4). It should be noted that weakly associated forms of water (signal 3) are also represented by several types of clusters that have a radius in the range R = 1–10 nm, and their size distribution changes significantly during immobilization of lectin on the surface of AM1. Probably, weakly associated types of water are formed both in cavities, between polymer chains of protein molecules, and on the surface of AM1, free of protein.