Collapse and association of denatured lentinan in water/dimethlysulfoxide solutions.

Triple helical lentinan, beta-(1-->3)-D-glucan from Lentinus edodes, was denatured in dimethlysulfoxide (DMSO) into single random coils. The DMSO solutions of randomly coiled lentinan were diluted with pure water to different wH (the weight fraction of water in the mixed solvent), and their specific optical rotation [alpha]D, reduced viscosity (lnetar)/c, and hydrodynamic radius Rh were investigated as a function of wH and storage time t. With an increase of wH from 0.1 to 0.2, [alpha]D increased sharply, suggesting that transition of conformation of the macromolecules has occurred. When wH was lower than 0.1, (lnetar)/c of lentinan in water-diluted DMSO exhibited the almost same value as that in pure DMSO and changed hardly with increasing t. Interestingly, (lnetar)/c decreased to reach a minimum with a further increase of wH from 0.1 to 0.25 and then increased with a continuous increase of wH from 0.25 to 0.5. Both (lnetar)/c and Rh of the denatured lentinan in water-diluted DMSO with wH of approximately 0.25 both exhibited a minimum, indicating that collapsed coil chains have occurred. All of the experimental findings revealed that the behaviors of lentinan in water-diluted DMSO solution with wH < 0.1 were consistent with that in good solvent, DMSO. When wH = 0.25, the quality of the mixed solvents became worse, and the dominant intramacromolecular hydrogen-bond interaction enhanced, leading to minimum of viscosity and size of the chains as a result of the collapsed coils. When wH > 0.25, the quality of the mixture weakens further, and the intermolecular hydrogen-bond interaction enhanced and was dominant, leading to aggregation of the collapsed chains.