title: Mimicry of dimerization by synthetic peptides designed to target homologous regions of proteins.
abstract: Rapid progress in sequencing various genomes has highlighted the need for the development of biochemical reagents for the detection of thousands of expressed gene products. The magnitude of this detection problem exceeds current technical capabilities. In an attempt to address this shortcoming, a novel approach has been developed called mimicry of dimerization. Peptide tags have been designed to bind to a specific region of parvalbumin on the basis of amino acid sequence homology with this segment. Multivalent ligands were produced by coupling the synthetic peptides to activated dextran polymers and binding was assessed by chemiluminescence of enhanced avidity reactions using a high density of target protein at the binding surface. Binding of the peptide ligands to parvalbumin was strongest under assay conditions that enriched for native monomeric protein and was affected by pH, temperature and solvent conditions. The results suggest that it should be possible to develop specific reagents for tagging proteins on the basis of sequence and secondary structure information.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, LSU Health Sciences Center, Shreveport, LA 71130, USA. ddwyer@lsuhsc.edu
authors.forename: Donard S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Dwyer
authors.forename: Timothy D
authors.initials: TD
authors.lastname: Ardizzone
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D015153:Blotting, Western; D003911:Dextrans / Q000737:chemistry; D019281:Dimerization; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D004591:Electrophoresis, Polyacrylamide Gel; D016678:Genome; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D008024:Ligands; D008163:Luminescent Measurements; D008958:Models, Molecular; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010320:Parvalbumins / Q000737:chemistry; D010452:Peptide Biosynthesis; D010455:Peptides / Q000737:chemistry*; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry; D011485:Protein Binding; D017433:Protein Structure, Secondary; D011506:Proteins / Q000737:chemistry*; D012984:Software; D013696:Temperature
chemical_list: D003911:Dextrans; D008024:Ligands; D010320:Parvalbumins; D010455:Peptides; D011108:Polymers; D011506:Proteins