Analyzing Ice Recrystallization Inhibition Using Amino Acids in High Pressure Conditions and Implementing Spatially Resolved Chord Length Distribution

Abstract

Even today, ice crystallization is still a research subject that is studied in various fields of science but has been barely explored. Within the ice crystallization research, one of the most common research subjects is ice recrystallization inhibition (IRI). Within this research, the influence of peptides and peptoids on IRI has been an emerging research subject. However, there has still not been much successful results on how peptides and peptoids affect or enhance IRI. Another subject that has not been explored is the effects of ice crystallization at high pressure. The first part of this study aims to study and compare the IRI effects of amino acids and peptoids to peptides in different ice phases, specifically ice VI. The effects of amino acids on ice VI were studied utilizing a method known as the "squeeze" assay. A solution of alpha-alanine and sodium chloride were loaded into a Merrill-Bassett diamond anvil cell which was utilized for ice crystallization at high pressure. The IRI effects of alpha-alanine were observed during ice crystallization. Another obstacle in IRI research is that there is still no analytical method that provides precise quantitative data for non-uniform crystal structures. Adding impurities to water leads to non-uniform ice crystallization. The second part of this study focuses on proving how effective a novel quantitative data analysis method known as Spatially Resolved-Chord Length Distribution (SR-CLD), which measures the spatial variation of non-uniform ice crystals, can be useful. The accuracy of SR-CLD was tested by utilizing a preprocessing method, then analyzing the spatial variation of the non-uniform ice crystals using the SR-CLD algorithm. Results showed that the amino acids were just as highly effective as ice recrystallization inhibitors as peptides on ice VI and that SR-CLD is confidently capable of quantifying spatial variation of the ice crystals.