SVD-aided pseudo principal-component analysis: A new method to speed up and improve determination of the optimum kinetic model from time-resolved data.

Determination of the optimum kinetic model is an essential prerequisite for characterizing dynamics and mechanism of a reaction. Here, we propose a simple method, termed as singular value decomposition-aided pseudo principal-component analysis (SAPPA), to facilitate determination of the optimum kinetic model from time-resolved data by bypassing any need to examine candidate kinetic models. We demonstrate the wide applicability of SAPPA by examining three different sets of experimental time-resolved data and show that SAPPA can efficiently determine the optimum kinetic model. In addition, the results of SAPPA for both time-resolved X-ray solution scattering (TRXSS) and transient absorption (TA) data of the same protein reveal that global structural changes of protein, which is probed by TRXSS, may occur more slowly than local structural changes around the chromophore, which is probed by TA spectroscopy.