News and Research Archive
Peptide Gels
Reflecting recent work in the Schneider lab
Researchers in the Schneider lab, published in Angewandte Chemie, Intl. Ed., discuss how peptide nucleic acids, PNAs, are employed in the design...
Peptide & Enzyme Catalysts
Reflecting recent work in the Wennemers lab
Enzymes and peptide catalysts consist of the same building blocks but require vastly different environments to operate best. Published in Angewandte...
Self-Assembled Nanofibers
Reflecting recent work in the Sabatino lab
Amphiphilic peptide sequences are conducive to secondary structures that self-assemble into higher-ordered peptide nanostructures. A select set...
Novel Substrate Prediction
Reflecting recent work in the Parker lab
The TAM family of receptor tyrosine kinases is implicated in multiple distinct oncogenic signaling pathways. However, to date, there are no...
Coiled Coils
Reflecting recent work in the Price lab
Coiled coils are one of most common protein quaternary structures and represent the best understood relationship between amino acid sequence and protein...
Network Pharmacology
Reflecting recent work in the Jin lab
Carapax Trionycis is a traditional Chinese medicine and it has been clear that oligo-peptides from Carapax Trionycis extract, CTP, are the main active substances...
Azobenzene Moiety
Reflecting recent work in the Wiedman lab
Azobenzenes are a series of compounds that can be isomerized upon irradiation with light. These molecules can...
Monoclonal Antibodies
Reflecting recent work in the Nowick lab
Monoclonal antibodies, mAbs, that target the β-amyloid peptide, Aβ, are important Alzheimer's disease research tools and are now being...
Novel, Rational Drug Design
Reflecting recent work in the Deber lab
As an alternative approach to conventional antibiotics, members of the Charles Deber laboratory, published in Peptide Science, explore a novel...
Bicyclic Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Nitsche lab
Bicyclic peptides have emerged as one of the driving forces within the constrained peptide family. Due to their unique pharmaceutical attributes...
Self-Sorting Collagen
Reflecting recent work in the Wennemers lab
Nature uses elaborate methods to control protein assembly, including that of heterotrimeric collagen....
Lasso Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Swanson lab
Lasso peptides make up a class of natural products characterized by a threaded structure. Given their small size and stability, chemical synthesis would offer tremendous potential...
Alzheimer’s Amyloid-β
Reflecting recent work in the Raskatov lab
Amyloid aggregation is a key feature of Alzheimer's disease, AD, and a primary target for past and present therapeutic efforts. Recent research is making it increasingly clear...
Detection of Pulmonary Fibrosis
Reflecting recent work in the Raines lab
Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, IPF, is a disease of unknown etiology that is characterized by excessive deposition and abnormal remodeling of collagen...
N-Terminal Acetylation
Reflecting recent work in the Petersson lab
N-terminal acetylation is a chemical modification carried out by N-terminal acetyltransferases. A major member of this enzyme family, NatB, acts on much of the human proteome...
Cooparative Trimerizer Helicons
Reflecting recent work from FOG Pharmaceuticals
Molecules that induce novel interactions between proteins hold great promise for the study of biological systems and the development of therapeutics, but their discovery...
Reversible Covalent Warheads
Reflecting recent work in the Gao lab
Falling in between traditional small molecules and antibodies in size, peptides are emerging as a privileged therapeutic modality, one that can harness...
Max Phosphorylation
Reflecting recent work in the Jbara lab
The chemical synthesis of site-specifically modified transcription factors, TFs, is a powerful method to investigate how post-translational modifications influence TF-DNA...
Mechanistic Studies of CyClick Chemistry
Reflecting recent work in the Raj and Houk labs
Macrocyclic peptides have become increasingly important in the pharmaceutical industry. In collaborative work between the groups of Kendall N. Houk and Monika Raj, published in...
Cytosolic Delivery of Functional Cargoes
Reflecting recent work in the Hackenberger lab
In research published in JACS, members of the Hackenberger Group, describe a powerful, simple, and highly effective strategy for the intracellular delivery...
SPAAC Reactions
Reflecting recent work in the Schneider lab
Joel P. Schneider, Yixin Xie, and Tania L. Lopez-Silva at the National Cancer Institute, report a new positively charged azidoamino acid for strain-promoted azide–alkyne cycloaddition...
Human Serum Albumin
Reflecting recent work in the Lam lab
Human serum albumin, HSA, is the most abundant protein in human blood plasma. It plays a critical role in the native transportation of numerous drugs, metabolites, nutrients, and small molecules...
Tyrosine Phosphorylation
Reflecting recent work in the Hecht lab
The family of NF-κB transcriptional activators controls the expression of many genes, including those involved in cell survival and development. The family consists of...
Pargamicin A
Reflecting recent work in the Del Valle lab
Researchers in the Del Valle Group, published in Organic Letters, report the total synthesis and configurational assignment of pargamicin A, a highly oxidized nonribosomal peptide...
Glycan Biology
Reflecting recent work in the Imperiali lab
Glycan-binding proteins, GBPs, are widely used reagents for basic research and clinical applications. These reagents allow for the identification and manipulation of glycan determinants...
Drug Candidate
Reflecting recent work in the Nowick lab
In this article, published in Chemical Science, members of the James S. Nowick group show that the antibiotic teixobactin is a promising drug candidate...
Stereoselectivity
Reflecting recent work in the Wennemers lab
In this article we show that stereoselective peptide catalysis is feasible in complex environments, including cell lysates...
Anticancer Protein
Reflecting recent work in the Bagheri lab
Cancer is one of the leading causes of mortality in the world. Unfortunately, the present anticancer chemotherapeutics display high cytotoxicity...
Peptides and Proteins
Reflecting recent work in the Raines lab
Transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) plays important roles in wound healing. The activity of TGF-β is initiated upon the binding of the growth factor...
Cyclic Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Heinis lab
The synthesis of large numbers of cyclic peptides─required, for example, in screens for drug development─is currently limited by the need of chromatographic...
Ribosomal synthesis
Reflecting recent work in the Suga lab
Aromatic cyclic β2,3-amino acids (cβAAs), such as 2-aminobenzoic acid and 3-aminothiophene-2-carboxylic acid, are building blocks that can induce unique folding...
PKC Disruptors
Reflecting recent work in the Kennedy lab
Protein Kinase C (PKC) is a member of the AGC subfamily of kinases and regulates a wide array of signaling pathways and physiological processes...
“Imprint-and-Report” DCLs
Reflecting recent work in the Waters lab
Sensor arrays using synthetic receptors have found great utility in analyte detection, resulting from their ability to distinguish analytes based on differential signals via...
Kinase inhibitors
Reflecting recent work in the Kennedy lab
Leucine-Rich Repeat Kinase 2 (LRRK2) is a large, multidomain protein with dual kinase and GTPase function that is commonly mutated in both familial and idiopathic...
Protease Inhibitors
Reflecting recent work in the Petersson lab
Aberrant levels of cathepsin L (Cts L), a ubiquitously expressed endosomal cysteine protease, have been implicated in many diseases such as cancer and diabetes...
Antibacterial Hydrogels
Reflecting recent work in the Schneider lab
Herein, it is demonstrated that a peptide derived from mussel foot protein-5, a key protein in mussel adhesion, displays antibacterial properties, a yet unreported...
Protein Interactions
Reflecting recent work in the Pikaard lab
In plants, transcription of selfish genetic elements such as transposons and DNA viruses is suppressed by RNA-directed DNA methylation...
Protein Mimic
Reflecting recent work in the Arora lab
Members of the Arora lab constructed a synthetic Sos protein mimic that engages the wild-type and oncogenic forms of nucleotide-bound Ras and modulates downstream kinase signaling...
Rippled β-Sheet Motif
Reflecting recent work in the lab
In this conspectus, the authors give an overview of the early history of the rippled β-sheet and provide a detailed structural description/definition of this motif...
Ion Channels
Reflecting recent work in the Woolfson lab
The design of peptides that assemble in membranes to form functional ion channels is challenging. Specifically, hydrophobic interactions must be...
B-cell Epitope
Reflecting recent work in the Kaumaya lab
Herein, researchers in the Kaumaya lab describe a novel PD-1 B-cell peptide epitope vaccine (amino acid 92–110; PD1-Vaxx) linked to a measles virus fusion peptide...
Peptide Cancer Vaccines
Reflecting recent work in the lab
In this article, Professor Pravin Kaumaya reviews his lab's approaches and strategies that focus on B-cell epitope cancer vaccines...
Production Technology
Reflecting recent work in the Schwarz lab
The production of peptides as active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) by recombinant technologies is of emerging interest. A reliable production platform, however...
Protein Synthesis
Reflecting recent work in the Premdjee lab
Chemical protein synthesis is a powerful avenue for accessing homogeneously modified proteins, but access to large targets has proved challenging...
Peptide Libraries
Reflecting recent work in the Derda lab
Herein is described a divergent late-stage approach to generating macrocyclic peptide libraries with unnatural pharmacophores from readily available starting material...
Peptide Synthesis
Reflecting recent work in the Brik lab
Despite six decades of efforts to synthesize peptides and proteins bearing multiple disulfide bonds, this synthetic challenge remains an unsolved problem...
Peptide-Based Vaccines
Reflecting recent work in the lab
In this Review, the authors discuss peptide-based vaccines and their potential in three therapeutic areas: infectious disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and cancer...
Stapled Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Han lab
Diabetes is characterized by pancreas dysfunction and is commonly associated with obesity. Hypoglycemic agents capable of improving β-cell function...
Protein-Protein Interactions
Reflecting recent work in the Pomerantz lab
Herein is reported the first application of protein-observed fluorine (PrOF) NMR to the tandem bromodomains of BRD4 and BRDT to quantify the selectivity of their...
Lariat Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Lokey lab
Many lariat peptide natural products exhibit interesting biological activities, and some, such as griselimycin and didemnin B, are membrane permeable...
Endosomal Escape
Reflecting recent work in the Futaki lab
Endocytic pathways are practical routes for the intracellular delivery of biomacromolecules. Along with this, effective strategies for endosomal cargo release...
Oxime Ligation
Reflecting recent work in the Burke lab
The current review will focus on the authors’ use of peptide ligation to optimize PPI antagonists directed against several targets...
Tyr-Lock Peptide
Reflecting recent work in the O'Keefe lab
High-throughput screening for inhibitors of TDP1 activity resulted in the discovery of a new class of knotted cyclic peptides...
DNA nanotechnology
Reflecting recent work in the Seitz lab
DNA nanotechnology is an emerging field that promises fascinating opportunities for the manipulation and imaging of proteins on a cell surface...
Cyclic Peptide Ligands
Reflecting recent work in the Suga lab
Herein is identified three cyclic peptide ligands of K-Ras(G12D) using an integrated in vitro translation−mRNA display selection platform...
Peptidomimetic Uptake
Reflecting recent work in the Arora lab
Researchers in the Arora Lab observed that the cellular uptake of peptides is critically determined by the cell line-specifically, they noted that peptides show better uptake...
Antimicrobial Synergy
Reflecting recent work in the Raines lab
Authors Chelcie Eller and Ron Raines find that human LL-37 and human RNase 1 can act synergistically to kill Gram-negative bacterial cells...
Social Media Guide
Reflecting recent work in the Heemstra lab
An ACS editorial that provides scientists a guide to navigating and using social media to share ideas and enhance connections...
Membrane-Lytic Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Schneider lab
Herein is described the use of peptide backbone N-methylation as a new strategy to transform membrane-lytic peptides (MLPs) into cytocompatible intracellular delivery vehicles...
Frog-skin Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Craik lab
In this study, the researchers investigated naturally occurring peptides derived from frog skin secretions for selectivity and activity toward melanocortin receptors...
Flow SPPS
Reflecting recent work in the Hartrampf lab
Flow‐based approaches to solid phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) have been pursued since the method's early days, with anticipated gains in...
Bioorthogonal Conjugation
Reflecting recent work in the Salmain lab
This minireview intends provides an up‐to‐date overview on the various bioorthogonal strategies implemented for the conjugation of transition organometallic entities...
Coronavirus Inhibitors
Reflecting recent work in the Hoffman lab
The novel coronavirus disease COVID-19 that emerged in 2019 is caused by the virus SARS CoV-2 and named for its close genetic similarity to SARS CoV-1...
Targeting Malaria
Reflecting recent work in the Kennedy lab
Herein is a review of ongoing research aimed at developing constrained peptides targeting protein-protein interactions pertinent to malaria pathogenesis.
Disrupt Ubiquitination
Reflecting recent work in the Walensky lab
The ubiquitin–proteasome system (UPS) is a highly regulated protein disposal process critical to cell survival. Inhibiting the pathway induces proteotoxic stress and can be an effective cancer treatment.
Cell Permeability
Reflecting recent work in the Verma lab
In a larger collaborative effort, these researchers have combined the strategies to identify the first examples of all-D α-helical stapled and stitched peptides.
Stapled Peptide
Reflecting recent work in the Garner lab
Eukaryotic translation initiation factor 4E (eIF4E) has emerged as a promising cancer therapeutic target due to its role in the initiation of cap-dependent translation...
Peptide Hydrogels
Reflecting recent work in the Schneider lab
Herein, a noninteracting multiphase molecular assembly approach is developed to crystallize tofacitinib, a potent JAK1/3 inhibitor, within a shearthinning self-assembled fibrillar peptide hydrogel network...
Antimicrobial Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Church lab
Church et al. report a tunable chemical genetics approach for enhancing genetic code expansion in different wild-type bacterial strains..
Protein Stability
Reflecting recent work in the Chatterjee lab
Abundant n → π* interactions between adjacent backbone carbonyl groups are predicted to play an important role in dictating the structure of proteins...
Modified Amino Acids
Reflecting recent work in the Wang lab
Herein, Wang et al. present a photoredox-catalyzed asymmetric method for the preparation of enantiopure β-thiolated/selenolated amino acids using a simple chiral auxiliary...
Mapping SARS-CoV-2
Reflecting recent work in the Ng lab
Given the ongoing SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, identification of immunogenic targets against the coronavirus spike glycoprotein will provide crucial advances towards the development of diagnostic tools...
COVID-19 Therapeutics
Reflecting recent work in the Yousef lab
In this review, the researchers summarize peptide and peptide based therapeutics that target one main entry pathway of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)...
Tyrosine Sulfation
Reflecting recent work in the Payne lab
Researchers at the University of Sydney have shown that the evasin protein ACA-01 from the Amblyomma cajennense tick can be posttranslationally sulfated at two tyrosine residues...
Micelle-assisted Reactions
Reflecting recent work in the Devaraj lab
This publication shows that micelle-assisted reaction can facilitate native chemical ligations between a peptide-thioester and a Cys-peptide modified by a lipid-like moiety...
Chemical Protein Synthesis
Reflecting recent work in the Mandal lab
Herein is reported an operationally simple method to facilitate chemical protein synthesis by fully convergent and one-pot native chemical ligations...
Targeting GPCRs
Reflecting recent work in the Davenport lab
This recently published review discusses the current status of the peptide drugs targeting G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), with a focus on evolving strategies...
β-Turn Mimics
Reflecting recent work in the Thomson lab
Researchers report a simple reductive amination protocol to ligate two peptides, while simultaneously installing a β-turn mimic at the ligation junction...
Fluorescent Peptide
Reflecting recent work in the Nowick lab
Teixobactin is a nonribosomal antibiotic peptide that inhibits the biosynthesis of peptidoglycan and teichoic acid, however, teixobactin’s cellular site of action is unknown...
Constrained Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Waldmann lab
Guéret and colleagues describe a versatile method for inserting chiral motifs between the ends of omega loops. Peptides are synthesized using traditional SPPS...
Coupling Agent Hazards
Reflecting recent work in the Nowick lab
This case study of anaphylaxis induced by three uronium coupling agents, HATU, HBTU, and HCTU, is a cautionary note for researchers who handle peptide coupling agents frequently...
Molecular Transporters
Reflecting recent work in the Parang lab
In this collaborative study, researchers have designed a new generation of peptides based on previously designed cyclic cell-penetrating peptides. They have evaluated their cytotoxicity as well as uptake behavior...
C1B1 Inhibition
Reflecting recent work in the Pearce lab
In this recent publication, Puhl et al. have employed random peptide phage display to screen and select peptides that bind to the calcium and integrin binding protein 1 (CIB1)...
Aqueous SPPS
Reflecting recent work in the Kolmar lab
The growing interest in synthetic peptides has prompted the development of viable methods for their sustainable production. Currently, large amounts of toxic solvents are required for peptide assembly...
Cyclotide Uptake
Reflecting recent work in the Wang lab
In this study, the recently developed chloroalkane penetration assay was combined with established assays to characterize the cellular uptake and cytosolic delivery of the prototypic cyclotide, kalata B1...
Cyclotide Production
Reflecting recent work in the Craik lab
In this manuscript researchers in Dr. Craik's lab describe a strategy to improve the production of cyclotides, which are usually produced and cyclized synthetically at a high cost and environmental impact for large scale.
Improved Thiol Protection
Reflecting recent work in the Distefano lab
Photoremovable caging groups are useful for biological applications because the deprotection process can be initiated by illumination with light without the necessity of adding additional reagents...
Peptide Self Assembly
Reflecting recent work in the Montenegro lab
Despite recent developments in two-dimensional self-assembly, most supramolecular 2D materials are assembled by tedious methodologies, with complex surface chemistry and small sizes...
Peptide Mimics
Reflecting recent work in the Liu lab
Peptides have important biological functions. However, their susceptibility to proteolysis limits their applications...
γ-Amino Acids Elongation
Reflecting recent work in the Suga lab
Because γ-amino acids generally undergo rapid self-cyclization upon esterification on the carboxyl group, for example, γ-aminoacyl-tRNA, there are no reports of the ribosomal elongation...
Nanosheet Fabrication
Reflecting recent work in the Conticello lab
Engineering free-standing 2D nanomaterials with compositional, spatial, and functional control across size regimes from the nano- to mesoscale represents a significant challenge....
Hydrophobic Moieties
Reflecting recent work in the Wennemers lab
Trans amide bonds and fast cis–trans isomerization of Xaa-Pro bonds are crucial for the stability and folding rate of collagen, the most abundant protein in mammals...
Platinum Nanoparticles
Reflecting recent work in the Wennemers lab
Hepatocellular carcinoma, HCC, is the sixth most frequent cancer and the second leading cause of death from cancer worldwide. Sorafenib is the most commonly used FDA‐approved systemic...
Ice Nucleators
Reflecting recent work in the Derda lab
In a manuscript published in Langmuir, Yuki Kamijo and Ratmir Derda from the, University of Alberta, describe a screening system that employs the difference...
Ghost Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Raines lab
A major hurdle in chemical biology is the delivery of native proteins into the cytosol of mammalian cells. Published in ACS Chemical Biology, and presented...
Octreotide Analogs
Reflecting recent work in the Papini lab
Somatostatin, SS, is a cyclic tetradecapeptide able to inhibit the release of growth hormone, GH, mainly through the binding to two G‐protein coupled...
Enzyme Sequestration
Reflecting recent work in the Xu lab
Liquid-like droplets of biomacromolecules are emerging as a fundamental mechanism of cellular signaling, but designing synthetic mimics to form such...
Short Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Arora lab
Helical secondary and tertiary motifs are commonly observed as binding epitopes in natural and engineered protein scaffolds. While several strategies...
Roads to Rome
Reflecting recent work in the Schmidt lab
Ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides, RiPPs, are ubiquitous natural products. Bioactive RiPPs are produced from a precursor...
Azapeptide Libraries
Reflecting recent work in the Lubell lab
Aza‐propargylglycine, azaPra, peptides are branching points for the synthesis of azapeptide libraries. Researchers in the Lubell Lab, published in...
Unprotected Peptides
Reflecting recent work in the Yoshiya lab
Ring-closing metathesis, RCM, is an attractive reaction for the preparation of artificially designed peptides. Until now, RCM has been used for fully or partially protected...