Understanding the solid-state structure of riboflavin through a multitechnique approach

Smalley, Christopher J. H., Hughes, Colan E., Hildebrand, Mariana, Aizen, Ruth, Bauer, Melanie, Yamano, Akihito, Levy, Davide, Mirsky, Simcha K., Shaked, Natan T., Young, Mark T. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9615-9002, Kolb, Ute, Gazit, Ehud, Kronik, Leeor and Harris, Kenneth D. M. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7855-8598 2024. Understanding the solid-state structure of riboflavin through a multitechnique approach. Crystal Growth and Design 24 (15) , pp. 6256-6266. 10.1021/acs.cgd.4c00480

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Abstract

Crystalline riboflavin (vitamin B2) performs an important biological role as an optically functional material in the tapetum lucidum of certain animals, notably lemurs and cats. The tapetum lucidum is a reflecting layer behind the retina, which serves to enhance photon capture and vision in low-light settings. Motivated by the aim of rationalizing its biological role, and given that the structure of biogenic solid-state riboflavin remains unknown, we have used a range of experimental and computational techniques to determine the solid-state structure of synthetic riboflavin. Our multitechnique approach included microcrystal XRD, powder XRD, three-dimensional electron diffraction (3D-ED), high-resolution solid-state 13C NMR spectroscopy, and dispersion-augmented density functional theory (DFT-D) calculations. Although an independent report of the crystal structure of riboflavin was published recently, our structural investigations reported herein provide a different interpretation of the intermolecular hydrogen-bonding arrangement in this material, supported by all the experimental and computational approaches utilized in our study. We also discuss, more generally, potential pitfalls that may arise in applying DFT-D geometry optimization as a bridging step between structure solution and Rietveld refinement in the structure determination of hydrogen-bonded materials from powder XRD data. Finally, we report experimental and computational values for the refractive index of riboflavin, with implications for its optical function.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Chemistry Biosciences
Publisher:	American Chemical Society
ISSN:	1528-7483
Funders:	EPSRC
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	24 July 2024
Date of Acceptance:	26 June 2024
Last Modified:	07 Aug 2024 08:52
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/170892

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