Self-Assembly-Assisted Kinetically Controlled Papain-Catalyzed Formation of mPEG- b-Phe(Leu) x

Biomacromolecules. 2020 Feb 10;21(2):493-507. doi: 10.1021/acs.biomac.9b01237. Epub 2019 Dec 26.

Abstract

Self-assembling peptide materials are promising next-generation materials with applications that include tissue engineering scaffolds, drug delivery, bionanomedicine, and enviro-responsive materials. Despite these advances, synthetic methods to form peptides and peptide-polymer conjugates still largely rely on solid-phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) and N-carboxyanhydride ring-opening polymerization (NCA-ROP), while green methods remain largely undeveloped. This work demonstrates a protease-catalyzed peptide synthesis (PCPS) capable of directly grafting leucine ethyl ester (Leu-OEt) from the C-terminus of a methoxy poly(ethylene glycol)-phenylalanine ethyl ester macroinitiator in a one-pot, aqueous reaction. By using the natural tendency of the growing hydrophobic peptide segment to self-assemble, a large narrowing of the (Leu)x distributions for both mPEG45-b-Phe(Leu)x and oligo(Leu)x coproducts, relative to oligo(Leu)x synthesized in the absence of a macroinitiator (mPEG45-Phe-OEt), was achieved. A mechanism is described where in situ β-sheet coassembly of mPEG45-b-Phe(Leu)x and oligo(Leu)x coproducts during polymerization prevents peptide hydrolysis, providing a means to control the degree of polymerization (DP) and dispersity of diblock (Leu)x segments (matrix-assisted laser desorption time-of-flight (MALDI-TOF) x = 5.1, dispersity ≤ 1.02). The use of self-assembly to control the uniformity of peptides synthesized by PCPS paves the way for precise peptide block copolymer architectures with various polymer backbones and amino acid compositions synthesized by a green process.

Publication types

  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

  • Buffers
  • Catalysis
  • Catalytic Domain
  • Dynamic Light Scattering
  • Hydrophobic and Hydrophilic Interactions
  • Leucine / chemistry
  • Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy
  • Microscopy, Electron, Scanning
  • Papain / chemistry*
  • Papain / metabolism
  • Peptides / chemical synthesis*
  • Peptides / chemistry
  • Phenylalanine / analogs & derivatives
  • Phenylalanine / chemistry
  • Polyethylene Glycols / chemistry*
  • Spectrometry, Mass, Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption-Ionization
  • Spectrophotometry, Infrared
  • Water / chemistry

Substances

  • Buffers
  • L-phenylalanine ethylester
  • Peptides
  • Water
  • Polyethylene Glycols
  • Phenylalanine
  • monomethoxypolyethylene glycol
  • Papain
  • Leucine