The effects of the aqueous solvent in the conformational preferences o
f peptides and homopeptides have been investigated using two different
and widely used self-consistent reaction-field models. The free energ
ies of solvation were predicted using the polarizable continuum model
developed by Tomasi and co-workers and adapted to semi-empirical hamil
tonians by Orozco and Luque, and the solvation model developed by Cram
er and Truhlar. The set of compounds investigated is constituted by fi
ve dipeptides with different chemical nature and structural properties
as well as by two homopeptides in which the size of the polypeptidic
chain was varied. Results provided by the different methods are compar
ed and discussed. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.