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IMPROVED MEASUREMENTS OF THE EFFECTS OF GLYCINE BETAINE AND PH ON GLUTAMIC ACID SOLUBILITY

Abstract

Osmolytes are small organic molecules that help cells regulate water concentration under stress. Measuring the interactions of osmolytes with proteins and other biopolymers is difficult, but essential to a complete understanding of water stress responses in cells. We added to our simple toolbox specific gravity bottles to improve measurements of density and solubility. We have implemented a new method to examine solubility of glutamic acid as a function of pH. These changes have improved the precision of saturated solution densities, and begun to generate a surface map of the density and solubility of glutamic acid solutions as a function of pH. We are one step closer to understanding discrepancies between two competing models for osmolyte effects on protein stability. Our results continue to support the hypothesis that a small number of errors, particularly on the solubility of glutamate and aspartate, are responsible for the major differences in conclusions between the group transfer free energy model (GTFE) and the local-bulk domain model (LBD) for the effects of glycine betaine on protein stability.

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