Acireductone dioxygenase (ARD) is a 179-residue enzyme containing a paramagnetic Ni
+2 ion in the active site. Because of electron-nuclear spin interactions,
1H resonances within ~9 &
Aring; of the Ni
+2 are broadened beyond detection. For this reason,
1H-detected multidimensional NMR ex
periments are not suitable for structural characterization of the active site of ARD, and no isostructural diamagnetic homologue is available. Rapid recycle two-dimensional direct
13C detection NMR methods previously allowed correlation of carbonyl (
13C') carbons with directly bonded
13C
and
15N spins in ARD (Kostic, M.; Pochapsky, S. S.; Pochapsky, T. C.
J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2002,
124, 9054-9055), but not
15N with
13C
, a critical connection for sequential assignment of backbone resonances. It is now shown that complete sample deuteration combined with direct
13C detection using a cold probe/preamplifier
permits the one-bond
13C
-
15N correlation to be made via a four-pulse double-quantum ex
periment CAN. Combined with data from other
13C direct-observe 2D NMR ex
periments, CAN data
permits sequential assignments to be made for many resonances in ARD close to the active-site metal.