UC San Diego

Hydrogen bonding is a key molecular interaction in biological processes, drug delivery, and catalysis. This report describes a high throughput UV-Vis spectroscopic method to measure hydrogen bonding capacity using a pyrazinone sensor. This colormetric sensor reversibly binds to a hydrogen bond donor, resulting in a blue shift as additional equivalents of donor are added. Titration with excess equivalents of donor is used to determine the binding coefficient, ln(K_eq ). Over 100 titrations were performed for a variety of biologically relevant compounds. This data enabled development a multiple linear regression model that is capable of predicting 95 % of ln(K_eq ) values within 1 unit, allowing for the estimation of hydrogen bonding affinity from a single measurement. To show the effectiveness of the single point measurements, hydrogen bond strengths were obtained for a set of carboxylic acid bioisosteres. The values from the single point measurements were validated with full titrations.