A custom peptide is a small polymer of amino acids that is chemically synthesized to order. Biotechnology companies frequently provide peptide services. Many peptides, such as hormones and toxins, have biological functions. Synthetic peptides are useful in research, medicine, and business. A large peptide library is frequently created to screen for peptides with specific functions, such as hormone or vaccine activity.
Peptides and proteins are made up of amino acids linked together in a chain. Peptides are traditionally defined as chains containing 50 or fewer amino acids. Proteins are longer chains of amino acids. Peptide bonds connect the N terminus of one amino acid to the C terminus of the next, forming chains.
The order in which the units are assembled is the main difference between natural amino acid assembly, which is mediated by ribosomes reading the code on messenger RNA, and synthetic amino acid assembly. Natural peptide synthesis begins at the N terminus, whereas custom peptide synthesis begins at the C terminus. The final molecules are exactly the same.
There are a variety of reasons why someone might need a custom peptide. Peptides from natural sources can be time consuming and require the use of valuable biological materials. Many peptides with useful functions do not exist in nature, according to the burgeoning field of peptidomimetics. They’re only available through the creation of custom peptides. A peptide containing unnatural amino acids, for example, is likely to have biological effects that differ from one containing amino acids found in nature.
For researchers who aren’t experts in the field, peptide synthesis in the lab can be challenging. Many companies hire peptide synthesis companies to create the custom peptide they need at a reasonable price. This can save the researcher a lot of time and money on the peptide synthesis set-up.
Peptide companies that specialize in the production of peptides or peptide libraries for researchers abound. A peptide library is a collection of peptides tailored to the researcher’s needs. If the researcher is working with hormones, for example, the peptides would be engineered to have a variety of sequences that could lead to the creation of new hormones.
With the advent of combinatorial chemistry, it is now possible to concentrate on creating a large number of peptides that are structurally similar. The active compounds in such a library can be screened. The peptide library is much more likely to include biologically active peptides if the peptidomimetics principle is used to design unusual peptides.