Peptide Synthesis Core

Instrumental Resourses

1. Multiple Peptide Synthesizer (Advanced Chemtech 396 omega)
This robotic synthesizer is able to prepare in parallel up to 96 different sequences Scales range for each batch between 10 and 200 mg.

2. Manual Reactors for Solid Phase Synthesis
This useful device is largely used when syntheses require full time control.

3. Analytical/semi-preparative HPLC (Beckmann-Coulter, system Gold)
This dual instrument can be used both for sample analyses and purification. 1 to 50 mg of purified compounds can be recovered depending by the used scale.

4. Access to the proteomic center
LC-MS characterization of all synthesize compound is performed by a fully automated HPLC-mass spectrometer integrated system (Finnigan)

Capabilities

1. Standard Solid Phase Synthesis of peptides/Fmoc strategy:

Peptide synthesis is routinely performed using the multiple peptide synthesizer by Fmoc strategy.

An in-house developed, optimized protocol is employed to obtain the best compromise between minimum time and best analytical quality for multiple automatic synthesis.

2. Peptides including unusual monomers/ peptide labeled by fluorescent molecules or metal chelator agents

Peptide including special building blocks (D or unusual aminoacids, various spacers etc) are very frequently prepared.

In addition we very often provide peptides with a variety of labels, like biotinylation, addition of fluorescent moieties (Fluorescein and Rhodamine based) or Bifunctional metal chelating agents, a list of which is given below here:

Dota, a widely used chelating agent for most metal

Cb-Te2A a copper-64 cross-bridged chelating agent

CHX-A” a cyclohexyl derivative of DTPA

3. Preparation of Multiple Antigen Peptides (MAP), other branched construct (C-terminal labeled compounds) or cyclic peptides

MAP molecules of several tumor-avid peptides (TF, ErbB-2, PSMA, alpha-MSH etc) are synthesized using specific 'state of art' or in-home optimized technology to obtain all the required geometry, e.g. Etero or homo MAP's, doubled or tetra-branched, C-teminal labeling etc

The following depicts a Structure of a C-terminal Biotin labeled, double armed hetero-MAP, bringing two sequences named 'P30-1' and 'Erb-2'

Cyclic peptides are others challenging constructs prepared by use of combinations of optimized protocols, according to the specific needs.

An example given here show the structure of a DOTA-labeled cyclic peptides (sequence derived from modified alpha-MSH-avid peptide

4. Synthesis of combinatorial libraries / Deconvolution for identification of better binders:

Combinatorial libraries are synthesized using either 'mix and split' or by addition of mixture of amino acids. Whatever method is used the possibility to utilize a multiple automatic synthesizer makes these approaches by far more affordable in terms of timework.

Deconvolution: Different methods can be used which typically consist of an iterative scanning of each position of the libraries in order to identify the amino acid conferring better binding in the given position.

5. Peptide Nucleic Acid (PNA) synthesis:

The synthetic strategy for PNA polymer is a slight modification of the standard Fmoc-chemistry, and it requires the use of manual reaction which we used for synthesis of long (14-18) PNA polymers with very specific anti-sense properties.

In addition by using alternate methods/instruments, we also synthesized and purified chimera molecules consisting of a PNA moiety covalently bound to a peptidic sequence and labeled either with fluorescent or radio labeled molecules.

Linear or branched schematic structures of these conjugates are shown below:

Contact Information

Please contact Dr. Fabio Gallazzi for information on peptide synthesis, consultation on peptide design and pricing.

Dr. Fabio Gallazzi
Research Assistant Professor
Peptide Synthesis Core
573-884-8943
gallazzif@missouri.edu