2D 1H-31P solid-state NMR studies of the dependence of inter-bilayer water dynamics on lipid headgroup structure and membrane peptides

The dynamics of hydration-water in several phospholipid membranes of different compositions is studied by 2D 1H-31P heteronuclear correlation NMR under magic-angle spinning. By using a 1H T2 filter before and a 1H mixing-time after the evolution period and 31P detection, inter-bilayer water is selectively detected without resonance overlap from bulk water outside the multilamellar vesicles. Moreover the 1H T2 relaxation time of the inter-bilayer water is measured. Lipid membranes with labile protons either in the lipid headgroup or in sterols exhibit water-31P correlation peaks while membranes free of exchangeable protons do not, indicating that the mechanism for water-lipid correlation is chemical exchange followed by relayed magnetization transfer to 31P. In the absence of membrane proteins, the inter-bilayer water 1H T2's are several tens of milliseconds. Incorporation of charged membrane peptides shortened this inter-bilayer water T2 significantly. This T2 reduction is attributed to the peptides' exchangeable protons, molecular motion and intermolecular hydrogen bonding, which affect the water dynamics and the chemically relayed magnetization transfer process.