Modeling nuclear resonance vibrational spectroscopic data of binuclear nonheme iron enzymes using density functional theory

Nuclear resonance vibrational spectroscopy (NRVS) is a powerful technique that can provide geometric structural information on key reaction intermediates of Fe-containing systems when utilized in combination with density functional theory (DFT). However, in the case of binuclear nonheme iron enzymes, DFT-predicted NRVS spectra have been found to be sensitive to the truncation method used to model the active sites of the enzymes. Therefore, in this study various-level truncation schemes have been tested to predict the NRVS spectrum of a binuclear nonheme iron enzyme, and a reasonably sized DFT model that is suitable for employing the NRVS/DFT combined methodology to characterize binuclear nonheme iron enzymes has been developed.