Insights on Alanine and Arginine Binding to Silica with Atomic Resolution.

Interactions of biomolecules with inorganic oxide surfaces such as silica in aqueous solutions are of profound interest in various research fields, including chemistry, biotechnology, and medicine. While there is a general understanding of the dominating electrostatic interactions, the binding mechanism is still not fully understood. Here, chromatographic zonal elution and flow microcalorimetry experiments were combined with molecular dynamic simulations to describe the interaction of different capped amino acids with the silica surface.