Pancreatic cancer (PC, mostly pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma, PDAC) is one of the most aggressive and dangerous cancerous diseases with a very poor prognosis and high mortality. Thus, there is a need to develop new and more effective treatments to cure this disease. Among the many newly developing therapeutic approaches, peptide-based drug targeting provides a new tool for this purpose. Alfa Cytology offers peptide drug development services for PC, including peptide screening, peptide design and optimization, custom peptide synthesis, and peptide validation and evaluation.
Overview of anti-tumor peptides
Peptides can also be obtained through proteolysis of animal and plant proteins, artificial chemical synthesis, and bioengineering in three ways. Based on rational approaches with high specificity, they can be designed to bind and modulate protein interactions of interest. Peptide sequences can also be easily regulated as they are easily synthesized by chemical or molecular biology techniques. Since many sequences, structures and pattern interactions for oncogenic proteins are available, peptides can be specifically designed as inhibitors of these interactions. With the incorporation of different stable structural modifications and new drug delivery systems, short peptides have proven to be promising drugs for cancer therapy. Peptides are attracting attention in the development of anti-tumor drugs because of their targeting, safety, and specificity. Based on their mechanism of action, anti-tumor peptides can be divided into inhibitory, necrosis-inducing, and pro-apoptotic peptides.
Benefits of short peptides
- Short peptides have several important advantages over full-length proteins and antibodies: less immunogenic, more stable ex vivo, higher activity, greater specificity and affinity, easier to synthesize and modify, and lower cost.
- In comparison with small organic molecules, peptides have higher efficacy and specificity, and better biocompatibility.
- Since short peptides have a highly selective mechanism of action and the main products of peptide metabolism are amino acids, they have lower toxic effects.
Our services and capabilities
-Activity-directed biochemical and chromatographic separation methods
-Artificially designed phage display peptide library screening
-PC Tumor microenvironment-based peptide screening
-Biophenotype-based peptide screening
-AI-driven peptide design & optimization
-Variety of chemical modifications
-Design and synthesis of derived peptides
-Design and synthesis of fusogenic peptides
-Peptide physical chemistry analysis
-Peptide bioanalytics and formulation analysis
-Peptide targeting assessment in vitro and in vivo
-Effect of the peptides on PC cells and mitochondria
-Effect of the peptides on PC tumor growth in vivo
-Systemic toxicity in vivo
Alfa Cytology is a solution provider with a deep appreciation of both the challenges and the potential of your molecule. During the development process of peptide drugs, we provide our services in a modular and integrated manner according to our customers' requirements. Our highly skilled and professional scientists are committed to selecting the most appropriate methods and techniques for each project. For more details on how we help our clients identify new ways to improve study design and anticipate development challenges, please contact us. We've got everything covered for your needs and look forward to working with you on your next project.
References
- Fisher, Elizaveta, et al. "Peptide-based therapeutics for oncology." Pharmaceutical Medicine 33.1 (2019): 9-20.
- Kozlowski, Michael R., and Roni E. Kozlowski. "A novel, small peptide with activity against human pancreatic cancer." American Journal of Cancer Research 10.5 (2020): 1356.
- Marqus, Susan, Elena Pirogova, and Terrence J. Piva. "Evaluation of the use of therapeutic peptides for cancer treatment." Journal of biomedical science 24.1 (2017): 1-15.