Through Hydrogen-Bond Vibrational Coupling in Hydrogen-Bonding Chains of 4-Pyridones with Implications for Peptide Amide I Absorptions:  Density Functional Theory Compared with Transition Dipole Coupling

We present B3LYP/D95** calculations on the C=O and N-H couplings in H-bonded chains of 4-pyridones. 14C-substitutions are used to decouple various vibrations for purposes of illustration. The coupled C=O vibrations bear analogy to the amide I bands of proteins and peptides. The coupling of the C=O's occurs primarily via the cooperative H-bonds rather than transition dipole coupling (TDC), as demonstrated by the fact that (1) the couplings are greater than previously reported for similar studies on formamides despite the larger distance between the C=O's in the pyridone chains (TDC coupling decreases with distance) and (2) the red shifts (also greater than for formamides) can be attributed to the changes in the geometries (particularly the C=O bond lengths) of the individual 4-pyridones in the H-bonding chains induced by the H-bonds and resulting polarization of the monomers.