An ultrarapid-mixing continuous-f low method has been developed to study submillisecond folding of chemically denatured proteins. Turbulent f low created by pumping solutions through a small gap dilutes the denaturant in tens of microseconds. We have used this method to study cytochrome c folding kinetics in the previously inaccessible time range 80 s to 3 ms. To eliminate the hemeligand exchange chemistry that complicates and slows the folding kinetics by trapping misfolded structures, measurements were made with the imidazole complex. Fluorescence quenching due to excitation energy transfer from the tryptophan to the heme was used to monitor the distance between these groups. The f luorescence decrease is biphasic. There is an unresolved process with < 50 s, followed by a slower, exponential process with ‫؍‬ 600 s at the lowest denaturant concentration (0.2 M guanidine hydrochloride). These kinetics are interpreted as a barrier-free, partial collapse to the new equilibrium unfolded state at the lower denaturant concentration, followed by slower crossing of a free energy barrier separating the unfolded and folded states. The results raise several fundamental issues concerning the dynamics of collapse and barrier crossings in protein folding.

Cytochrome c folding was initiated using a new solution mixer that provides a time window which covers over 90% of the burst phase unresolved by conventional stop-flow measurements. Folding was followed by resonance Raman scattering. Kinetic analysis of the high frequency Raman data indicates that a nascent phase occurs within the mixing dead time of 100 microseconds. A significant fraction of the protein was found to be trapped in a misfolded bis-histidine form during the nascent phase at pH 4.5, thereby preventing the protein from folding rapidly and homogeneously. The nascent phase was followed by a haem-ligand exchange phase that populates the native histidine-methionine coordinated form through a thermodynamically controlled equilibrium.

An asymmetric tail-to-tail cross-hydroalkenylation of vinylarenes with terminal olefins was achieved by catalysis with NiH complexes bearing chiral N-heterocyclic carbenes (NHCs). The reaction provides branched gem-disubstituted olefins with high enantioselectivity (up to 94 % ee) and chemoselectivity (cross/homo product ratio: up to 99:1). Electronic effects of the substituents on the vinylarenes and on the N-aryl groups of the NHC ligands, but not a π,π-stacking mechanism, assist the steric effect and influence the outcome of the cross-hydroalkenylation.

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