Structure, supramolecular organization and phase behavior of N-acyl-β-alanines: Structural homologues of mammalian brain constituents N-acylglycine and N-acyl-GABA

N-Acyl-β-alanines (NABAs) are structural homologues of N-acylglycines (NAGs) and N-acyl-γ-aminobutyric acids (NAGABAs), and achiral isomers of N-acylalanines, which are all present in mammalian brain and other tissues and modulate activity of biological receptors with various functions. In the present study, we synthesized and characterized a homologous series of NABAs bearing saturated acyl chains (n=8-20) and investigated their supramolecular organization and thermotropic phase behavior. In differential scanning calorimetric (DSC) studies, most of the NABAs gave one or two minor transitions before the main chain-melting phase transition in the dry state as well as upon hydration with water, but gave only a single transition when hydrated with buffer (pH7.6). Transition enthalpies (ΔHt) and entropies (ΔSt), obtained from the DSC studies showed linear dependence on the chain length in the dry state and upon hydration with buffer, whereas odd-even alteration was observed when hydrated with water. The crystal structures of N-lauroyl-β-alanine (NLBA) and N-myristoyl-β-alanine (NMBA) were solved in monoclinic system in the P21/c space group. Both NLBA and NMBA were packed in tilted bilayers with head-to-head (and tail-to-tail) arrangement with tilt angles of 33.28° and 34.42°, respectively. Strong hydrogen bonding interactions between COOH groups of the molecules from opposite leaflets as well as NH⋯O hydrogen bonds between the amide groups from adjacent molecules in the same leaflet as well as dispersion interactions between the acyl chains stabilize the bilayer structure. The d-spacings calculated from powder X-ray diffraction studies showed odd-even alteration with odd-chain length compounds exhibiting higher values as compared to the even-chain length ones and the tilt angles calculated from the PXRD data are higher for the even chain NABAs. These observations are relevant to developing structure-activity relationships for these amphiphiles and understand how NABAs differ from their homologues and isomers, namely NAGs, NAGABAs, and N-acylalanines.