Triplet-state spin labels for highly sensitive pulsed dipolar spectroscopy

Abstract

Pulsed dipolar spectroscopic methods allow nanometer distance measurements between pairs of spin labels. We have proposed a new spin labelling approach, based on the population of a chromophore triplet under light excitation, testing it on a peptide-based spectroscopic ruler and a photosynthetic protein. We have applied a modified Pulsed Electron DOuble Resonance (PELDOR) sequence where the photogeneration of the triplet spin precedes the conventional 4-pulse PELDOR sequence. In this experiment, the triplet-state serves as detection spin while the stable nitroxide is the pump spin. Alternatively, a new method, Laser-Induced Magnetic Dipole spectroscopy (LaserIMD), has been proposed: the nitroxide signal is detected while a time varying laser pulse acts as a pump to generate the triplet state [C. Hintze, D. Bücker, S. Domingo Köhler, G. Jeschke and M. Drescher, J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 7 (12), 2204 (2016)]. For the first time, in this work, we compare the two dipolar techniques performing X-band experiments in the same experimental conditions and deriving analytical expressions for the echo modulation by the density matrix formalism.