Investigation of Solvation Effects in Small Peptides Using 13C NMR Manish A. Mehta, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Oberlin College Oberlin, OH 44074 The model compound, L-alanyl-L-alanine, is one of four dipeptides being investigated in this project. These compounds provide a fertile testing ground for the study of how the solvent environment influences molecular structure. The investigations are conducted using 13C NMR Spectroscopy. The interpretation of the data is aided by quantum chemical calculations. Two images below (left, center) represent the low-energy conformations of the compound in water, as derived from high-level ab initio calculations. The image on the right is the structure in the crystalline state, determined using x-ray diffraction.