Out-of-plane vibration modes of nucleic acid bases

The out-of-plane vibration modes of uracil, cytosine and their deuterated and methylated derivatives such as 1,5-dimethyluracil (1-methylthymine), I-methylcytosine, 5-methylcytosine and 1,5-dimethylcytosine have been computed. The calculated wave-numbers have been compared to the published Raman peak and infrared band positions observed for solid or aqueous samples. The calculations have been carried out on a non-redundant set of symmetrical coordinates and a valence force field has been used. Some characteristic modes located between 750 and 800 cm^-1 found in the infrared spectra of 2-deoxycytidine, 2-deoxythymidine 5-monophosphate and polynucleotides containing cytosine and thymine bases can be interpreted from the calculated results on 1-methylthymine and 1-methylcytosine.