Hydrogen Bonding in Biological Structures - Hardcover

Jeffrey, George A.; Saenger, Wolfram

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 3540508392 ISBN 13: 9783540508397

Publisher: Springer-Verlag Berlin and Heidelberg GmbH & Co. K, 1991

Synopsis

Hydrogen bonds are weak attractions, with a binding strength less than one-tenth that of a normal covalent bond. However, hydrogen bonds are of extraordinary importance; without them all wooden structures would collapse, cement would crumble, oceans would vaporize, and all living things would disintegrate into random dispersions of inert matter. Hydrogen Bonding in Biological Structures is informative and eminently usable. It is, in a sense, a Rosetta stone that unlocks a wealth of information from the language of crystallography and makes it accessible to all scientists. (From a book review of Kenneth M. Harmon, Science 1992)

About this title

Synopsis

During the last decade the advances in molecular biology have increasingly emphasized the importance of the hydrogen bond in biological interactions. Hydrogen-bonding in assemblages of biological molecules examined from the structural point of view is a main focus of the present book. Hydrogen-bonding is thereby defined in its broadest sense, as many attractive interactions involving a covalently bonded hydrogen atom. The concept of the hydrogen bond structure is developed, as is the role of cooperativity, in stabilizing particular structures and hydrogen-bonding dynamics. The information presented is based on the extraordinary increase in quantitative structural data that has become available from X-ray and neutron diffraction studies of crystal structures involving small and large biological molecules. Included are structural data of particular types of hydrogen bonds as well as data for different types of molecules, such as carbohydrates, purines and pyrimidines, nucleosides and nucleotides, ices and hydrates, cyclodextrins, nucleic acids and proteins.

Edition details

• Publisher: Springer-Verlag Berlin and Heidelberg GmbH & Co. K
• Publication date: 1991
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 3540508392
• ISBN 13: 9783540508397
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 583