H8 chemical shifts in oligonucleotide cross-linked at a GpG sequence by cis-Pt(NH3)2(2+): a clue to the adduct structure

Abstract

The origin of the anomalous H8 chemical shifts observed in 1H-NMR spectra of oligonucleotides cross-linked at a GpG sequence with cis-[Pt(NH3)2]2+ has been investigated and clarified. The main contributions that distinguish the H8 resonances of the two platinum-ligating guanines from other GH8 signals and from each other are: (a) the inductive effect of platinum binding which we have recently quantified as a downfield shift of 0.48 +/- 0.07 ppm (M. H. Fouchet, D. Lemaire, J. Kozelka and J.-C. Chottard, unpublished results); (b) the ring-current effect of one GpG guanine on the H8 resonance of the other guanine, which is negative (shielding) for the 5'-H8 and positive (deshielding) for the 3'-H8 in single-stranded adducts, but has the opposite sign in double-stranded adducts; (c) a deshielding polarization effect of the phosphate 5' to the GpG unit. The different signs of the ring-current effects in single-stranded and double-stranded oligonucleotides originate from the orientation of the guanines in the cis-[Pt(NH3)2(Gua)2]2+ moiety (Gua, guanine), which is left-handed helicoidal in single strands and right-handed helicoidal in double strands. In the platinated dinucleotides (cis-[Pt(NH3)2(GpG)]+, cis-[Pt(NH3)2(d(GpG))]+ and cis-[Pt(NH3)2(d(GpG))]), the guanines assume either the left-handed or the right-handed arrangement, depending on the sugar moiety (ribose or deoxyribose), protonation state at N1 and, in the solid state, on crystal forces. This work shows that chemical shifts contain valuable structural information which is complementary to that extracted from correlated spectroscopy and nuclear Overhauser spectroscopy data.