The infrared spectrum of matrix isolated aminoacetonitrile, a precursor to the amino acid glycine

We present infrared (IR) spectral data from matrix isolation experiments and density functional theory calculations on the pre-biologically interesting molecule aminoacetonitrile, a precursor to glycine. We find that this nitrile has an unusually weak nitrile (CdropN) stretch in the infrared, in contrast to expectations based on measurements and models of other nitriles under astrophysical conditions. The absence of an observable nitrile absorption feature in the infrared will make the search for this molecule by IR considerably more difficult, if not impossible. This is also of relevance to assessing the formation routes of the amino acid glycine, since aminoacetonitrile is the putative precursor to glycine via the Strecker synthesis, the mechanism postulated to have produced the amino acid glycine in meteorites. (C) 2003 COSPAR. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.