Fluorine-19 nuclear magnetic resonance investigation of fluorine-19-labeled phospholipids. 2. A line-shape analysis.

Fluorine-19 nuclear magnetic resonance spectra at 282.4 MHz of dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine specifically labeled with a difluoromethylene group at the 4-, 8-, or 12-position of the sn-2-acyl chain and dispersed in excess water show the characteristic powder-pattern line shapes associated with an anisotropic axially symmetric chemical shift tensor, altered by the presence of the homonuclear dipolar interaction of the fluorine nuclei and of heteronuclear dipolar interactions between fluorine and nearby protons. Values for the anisotropy of the fluorine-19 chemical shift and for the fluorine-fluorine internuclear vector order parameter, SFF, as a function of temperature have been determined for the phospholipid dispersions with and without cholesterol. An increased mobility is evidenced in both cases as the temperature is raised. For the phospholipid dispersions in water, the values of SFF parallel quite well the behavior of the carbon-deuterium internuclear vector order parameter, SCD, as determined by deuterium nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy for the same labeled position. The effect of adding cholesterol is seen as a restriction of the chain mobility and the eventual disappearance of the phase transition. These new experiments provide a value of 166 ppm for the anisotropy of the axially symmetric chemical shift tensor of a difluoromethylene group in a phospholipid acyl chain. They also demonstrate the feasibility as well as the advantages of using a difluoromethylene group as a probe for molecular motions in the phospholipid bilayers.