Hydration energies of sodiated amino acids from gas-phase equilibria determinations.

The sequential hydration of a number of sodiated amino acids is investigated using a high-pressure mass spectrometer. Ions produced continuously by electrospray are injected into the reaction chamber in the pulsed mode where the hydration equilibria, AANa+(H2O)n-1+H2O=AANa+(H2O)n (AA=Val, Pro, Met, Phe, and Gln), and the temperature dependence of the equilibrium constants are measured in the gas phase at 10 mbar (N2 bath gas and known pressure of H2O). The thermochemical properties, DeltaH degrees n, DeltaS degrees n, and DeltaG degrees n, for the hydrated systems are determined and discussed in conjunction with the structural forms. The results show that the binding energies of water to the AANa+ complexes decrease with the increasing number of water molecules. The present results from equilibrium measurements are compared to those from earlier studies obtained by other techniques. A correlation between the free energy changes for the addition of the first and second water molecules to AANa+, and the corresponding sodium ion affinities, is observed. Generally, the hydration free energy becomes weaker as the AA-Na+ bond strength increases.