S. Usui et al., MOLECULAR-DYNAMICS CONFORMATIONAL SEARCH FOR THE FACTORS THAT DETERMINE CONFORMATION OF MODIFIED CYCLODEXTRINS, Supramolecular chemistry, 9(1), 1998, pp. 57-67
Modified cyclodextrins (modified CDs), which have an appending moiety,
form various conformations depending on its moiety. In this study we
examined the factors that determine the conformation of modified CDs w
ith p-dimethylaminobenzoyl and p-nitrobenzoyl moiety as a pendant (DMA
B-beta-CD and NB-beta-CD, respectively) using computational chemistry.
The structures and potential energies were calculated using molecular
dynamics conformational search, and the relationship between conforma
tion and energy calculated from force field was investigated. These ca
lculations suggested that the conformation of the modified CDs is domi
nated by the opposing influences of the van der Waals energy, which fa
vors locating the appending moiety inside the CD cavity, and the angle
related to the bending energy, which favors the moiety outside the ca
vity.