The compounds Fujikurin
A, B, and D, recently isolated from
Fusarium fujikuroi
, possess intramolecular low-barrier hydrogen
bonds (LBHBs), which are hydrogen bonds with a very low-energy barrier
for proton transfer. The isolated compounds have a hydrogen-bonded
proton that appears to rapidly switch between two equilibrium states
via a transition state (TS). To understand the characteristics of
these intramolecular LBHBs in detail, we performed path integral molecular
dynamics (PIMD) simulations, which can consider nuclear quantum effects
(NQEs) under a finite temperature. The PIMD simulations predicted
that the NQE completely washed out the energy barrier for the proton
transfer reaction. Consequently, a single-well shape emerged in the
results, along with the effective free-energy potential surface for
the hydrogen-bonded proton distribution. Thus, we conclude that the
hydrogen-bonded proton in Fujikurin does not in fact transfer between
two equilibrium structures but widely delocalizes around the global
minimum structure involving the TS region.