Computational studies on the conformations of some large-ring cyclodextrins (CDn, n = 20, 21, 22, 23).

Computational studies were carried out on the conformations of large-ring cyclodextrins with degree of polymerization from 20 to 23. Principal component analysis (PCA) was applied for postprocessing of trajectories from conformational search, based on 100.0 ns molecular dynamics simulations. The dominant PCA modes for concerted motions of the macroring atoms were monitored in a lower-dimensions subspace. The first six lowest indexed principal components contribute more than 90% of the total atomic motions in all cases, with about 70% (CD21) to 83% (CD22) contribution coming from the three highest-eigenvalue principal components. Representative average geometries of the cyclodextrin macrorings were also obtained for the whole simulation and for the ten 10.0 ns time intervals of the simulation. We concluded that resemblance exists of the representative conformations of these four cyclodextrins with the circularized three-turn single helical structure proposed for CD21 from small-angle X-ray scattering, as well as with the representative conformations of CD26.