title: Synthetic peptides as binding-step based catalytic mimics.
abstract: Peptides able to adopt an environment-dependent secondary structure represent attractive models for enzyme mimics. An approach to design new synthetic enzyme-like peptides involves the use of binding-step based mimics. The polypeptide melittin, based on its intrinsic ability to bind to phospholipids, was selected as a potential binding-step based catalytic mimic. Synthetic melittin was found to exhibit weak but reproducible phospholipase-like activity. The rate enhancement of the hydrolysis of phospholipids, although far from that of the natural enzyme, was encouraging as a first step in the development of new catalytic peptides.
authors.affiliation: Torrey Pines Institute for Molecular Studies, San Diego, CA.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Pérez-Payá
authors.forename: R A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Houghten
authors.forename: S E
authors.initials: SE
authors.lastname: Blondelle
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D002384:Catalysis; D004798:Enzymes; D008555:Melitten / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010455:Peptides / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism*; D010743:Phospholipids / Q000378:metabolism; D017433:Protein Structure, Secondary
chemical_list: D004798:Enzymes; D010455:Peptides; D010743:Phospholipids; D008555:Melitten