Combinatorial libraries of peptide dendrimers: design, synthesis, on-bead high-throughput screening, bead decoding and characterization

Molecular Dynamics of Lysine Dendrigrafts in Methanol-Water Mixtures

The molecular dynamics method was used to study the structure and properties of dendrigrafts of the first and second generations in methanol-water mixtures with various volume fractions of methanol. At a small volume fraction of methanol, the size and other properties of both dendrigrafts are very similar to those in pure water. A decrease in the dielectric constant of the mixed solvent with an increase in the methanol fraction leads to the penetration of counterions into the dendrigrafts and a reduction of the effective charge. This leads to a gradual collapse of dendrigrafts: a decrease in their size, and an increase in the internal density and the number of intramolecular hydrogen bonds inside them. At the same time, the number of solvent molecules inside the dendrigraft and the number of hydrogen bonds between the dendrigraft and the solvent decrease. At small fractions of methanol in the mixture, the dominant secondary structure in both dendrigrafts is an elongated polyproline II (PPII) helix. At intermediate volume fractions of methanol, the proportion of the PPII helix decreases, while the proportion of another elongated β-sheet secondary structure gradually increases. However, at a high fraction of methanol, the proportion of compact α-helix conformations begins to increase, while the proportion of both elongated conformations decreases.

A Guideline for the Synthesis of Amino-Acid-Functionalized Monomers and Their Polymerizations

Amino acids have emerged as a sustainable source for the design of functional polymers. Besides their wide availability, especially their high degree of biocompatibility makes them appealing for a broad range of applications in the biomedical research field. In addition to these favorable characteristics, the versatility of reactive functional groups in amino acids (i.e., carboxylic acids, amines, thiols, and hydroxyl groups) makes them suitable starting materials for various polymerization approaches, which include step- and chain-growth reactions. This review aims to provide an overview of strategies to incorporate amino acids into polymers. To this end, it focuses on the preparation of polymerizable monomers from amino acids, which yield main chain or side chain-functionalized polymers. Furthermore, postpolymerization modification approaches for polymer side chain functionalization are discussed. Amino acids are presented as a versatile platform for the development of polymers with tailored properties.

Size and Structure of Empty and Filled Nanocontainer Based on Peptide Dendrimer with Histidine Spacers at Different pH

Novel peptide dendrimer with Lys-2His repeating units was recently synthesized, studied by NMR (Molecules, 2019, 24, 2481) and tested as a nanocontainer for siRNA delivery (Int. J. Mol. Sci., 2020, 21, 3138). Histidine amino acid residues were inserted in the spacers of this dendrimer. Increase of their charge with a pH decrease turns a surface-charged dendrimer into a volume-charged one and should change all properties. In this paper, the molecular dynamics simulation method was applied to compare the properties of the dendrimer in water with explicit counterions at two different pHs (at normal pH with neutral histidines and at low pH with fully protonated histidines) in a wide interval of temperatures. We obtained that the dendrimer at low pH has essentially larger size and size fluctuations. The electrostatic properties of the dendrimers are different but they are in good agreement with the theoretical soft sphere model and practically do not depend on temperature. We have shown that the effect of pairing of side imidazole groups is much stronger in the dendrimer with neutral histidines than in the dendrimer with protonated histidines. We also demonstrated that the capacity of a nanocontainer based on this dendrimer with protonated histidines is significantly larger than that of a nanocontainer with neutral histidines.

18 O/16 O-Encoding Strategy for Microscale Stereochemical Determination of Peptidic Natural Products

The demand for more efficient methods of establishing the undetermined stereochemistries of peptidic natural products continues unabated. A new method for microscale stereochemical determination was devised by integrating solid-phase synthesis, split-and-mix randomization, ¹⁸ O/¹⁶ O-encoding of d/l-configurations, tandem mass spectrometry, and biological evaluation. Here we applied gramicidin A as the molecule for a blind test. Gramicidin A and its 31 diastereomers were randomly prepared in microgram scale with ¹⁸ O/¹⁶ O-stereochemical encoding and subjected to MS/MS-structural determination and cytotoxicity assay. Only the parent gramicidin A was selected from among the 32 stereoisomers, validating the high reliability of the present strategy.

Why the Orientational Mobility in Arginine and Lysine Spacers of Peptide Dendrimers Designed for Gene Delivery Is Different?

New peptide dendrimer with Lys-2Arg repeating units was recently studied experimentally by NMR (RSC Advances, 2019, 9, 18018) and tested as gene carrier successfully (Int. J. Mol. Sci., 2020, 21, 3138). The unusual slowing down of the orientational mobility of 2Arg spacers in this dendrimer was revealed. It has been suggested that this unexpected behavior is caused by the Arg-Arg pairing effect in water, which leads to entanglements between dendrimer branches. In this paper, we determine the reason for this slowing down using atomistic molecular dynamics simulation of this dendrimer. We present that the structural properties of Lys-2Arg dendrimer are close to those of the Lys-2Lys dendrimer at all temperatures (Polymers, 2020, 12, 1657). However, the orientational mobility of the H-H vector in CH2-N groups of 2Arg spacers in Lys-2Arg dendrimer is significantly slower than the mobility of the same vector in the Lys-2Lys dendrimer. This result is in agreement with the recent NMR experiments for the same systems. We revealed that this difference is not due to the arginine-arginine pairing, but is due to the semiflexibility effect associated with the different contour length from CH2-N group to the end of the side arginine or lysine segment in spacers.

Discovery of gramicidin A analogues with altered activities by multidimensional screening of a one-bead-one-compound library

Gramicidin A (1) is a peptide antibiotic that disrupts the transmembrane ion concentration gradient by forming an ion channel in a lipid bilayer. Although long used clinically, it is limited to topical application because of its strong hemolytic activity and mammalian cytotoxicity, likely arising from the common ion transport mechanism. Here we report an integrated high-throughput strategy for discovering analogues of 1 with altered biological activity profiles. The 4096 analogue structures are designed to maintain the charge-neutral, hydrophobic, and channel forming properties of 1. Synthesis of the analogues, tandem mass spectrometry sequencing, and 3 microscale screenings enable us to identify 10 representative analogues. Re-synthesis and detailed functional evaluations find that all 10 analogues share a similar ion channel function, but have different cytotoxic, hemolytic, and antibacterial activities. Our large-scale structure-activity relationship studies reveal the feasibility of developing analogues of 1 that selectively induce toxicity toward target organisms.

The strong hemolytic activity and mammalian cytotoxicity of gramicidin A, a peptide antibiotic, has hindered its non-topical clinical application. Here, the authors report a high-throughput strategy for the discovery of gramicidin A analogues with altered biological activity profiles.

Populating Chemical Space with Peptides Using a Genetic Algorithm

In drug discovery, one uses chemical space as a concept to organize molecules according to their structures and properties. One often would like to generate new possible molecules at a specific location in the chemical space marked by a molecule of interest. Herein, we report the peptide design genetic algorithm (PDGA, code available at https://github.com/reymond-group/PeptideDesignGA ), a computational tool capable of producing peptide sequences of various topologies (linear, cyclic/polycyclic, or dendritic) in proximity of any molecule of interest in a chemical space defined by macromolecule extended atom-pair fingerprint (MXFP), an atom-pair fingerprint describing molecular shape and pharmacophores. We show that the PDGA generates high-similarity analogues of bioactive peptides with diverse peptide chain topologies and of nonpeptide target molecules. We illustrate the chemical space accessible by the PDGA with an interactive 3D map of the MXFP property space available at http://faerun.gdb.tools/ . The PDGA should be generally useful to generate peptides at any location in the chemical space.

Stereoselective pH Responsive Peptide Dendrimers for siRNA Transfection

Transfecting nucleic acids into cells is an essential procedure in biological research usually performed using nonviral transfection reagents. Unfortunately, most transfection reagents have polymeric or undisclosed structures and require nonstandard synthetic procedures. Herein we report peptide dendrimers accessible as pure products from standard building blocks by solid-phase peptide synthesis and acting as nontoxic single component siRNA transfection reagents for a variety of cell lines with equal or better performance than the gold standard lipofectamine L2000. Structure-activity relationships and mechanistic studies illuminate their transfection mechanism in unprecedented detail. Stereoselective dendrimer aggregation via intermolecular β-sheets at neutral pH enables siRNA complexation to form nanoparticles which enter cells by endocytosis. Endosome acidification triggers protonation of amino termini and rearrangement to an α-helical conformation forming smaller dendrimer/siRNA nanoparticles, which escape the endosome and release their siRNA cargo in the cytosol. Two particularly efficient d-enantiomeric dendrimers are proposed as new reference reagents for siRNA transfection.

Development of a high-throughput strategy for discovery of potent analogues of antibiotic lysocin E

Lysocin E, a 37-membered natural depsipeptide, induces rapid bacteriolysis in methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus via a unique menaquinone-dependent mechanism, presenting a promising therapeutic lead. Despite the great medical importance, exploring the potential utility of its derivatives as new platform structures for antibiotic development has remained a significant challenge. Here, we report a high-throughput strategy that enabled the preparation of thousands of analogues of lysocin E and large-scale structure-activity relationship analyses. We integrate 26-step total synthesis of 2401 cyclic peptides, tandem mass spectrometry-sequencing, and two microscale activity assays to identify 23 candidate compounds. Re-synthesis of these candidates shows that 11 of them (A1-A11) exhibit antimicrobial activity superior or comparable to that of lysocin E, and that lysocin E and A1-A11 share L-Leu-6 and L-Ile-11. Therefore, the present strategy allows us to efficiently decipher biologically crucial residues and identify potentially useful agents for the treatment of infectious diseases.

Chemical space guided discovery of antimicrobial bridged bicyclic peptides against Pseudomonas aeruginosa and its biofilms

Herein we report the discovery of antimicrobial bridged bicyclic peptides (AMBPs) active against Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a highly problematic Gram negative bacterium in the hospital environment. Two of these AMBPs show strong biofilm inhibition and dispersal activity and enhance the activity of polymyxin, currently a last resort antibiotic against which resistance is emerging. To discover our AMBPs we used the concept of chemical space, which is well known in the area of small molecule drug discovery, to define a small number of test compounds for synthesis and experimental evaluation. Our chemical space was calculated using 2DP, a new topological shape and pharmacophore fingerprint for peptides. This method provides a general strategy to search for bioactive peptides with unusual topologies and expand the structural diversity of peptide-based drugs.

Multivalency effects on Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilm inhibition and dispersal by glycopeptide dendrimers targeting lectin LecA

The galactose specific lectin LecA partly mediates the formation of antibiotic resistant biofilms by Pseudomonas aeruginosa, an opportunistic pathogen causing lethal airways infections in immunocompromised and cystic fibrosis patients, suggesting that preventing LecA binding to natural saccharides might provide new opportunities for treatment. Here 8-fold (G3) and 16-fold (G4) galactosylated analogs of GalAG2, a tetravalent G2 glycopeptide dendrimer LecA ligand and P. aeruginosa biofilm inhibitor, were obtained by convergent chloroacetyl thioether (ClAc) ligation between 4-fold or 8-fold chloroacetylated dendrimer cores and digalactosylated dendritic arms. Hemagglutination inhibition, isothermal titration calorimetry and biofilm inhibition assays showed that G3 dendrimers bind LecA slightly better than their parent G2 dendrimers and induce complete biofilm inhibition and dispersal of P. aeruginosa biofilms, while G4 dendrimers show reduced binding and no biofilm inhibition. A binding model accounting for the observed saturation of glycopeptide dendrimer galactosyl groups and LecA binding sites is proposed based on the crystal structure of a G3 dendrimer LecA complex.

Mini-ISES identifies promising carbafructopyranose-based salens for asymmetric catalysis: Tuning ligand shape via the anomeric effect

This study introduces new methods of screening for and tuning chiral space and in so doing identifies a promising set of chiral ligands for asymmetric synthesis. The carbafructopyranosyl-1,2-diamine(s) and salens constructed therefrom are particularly compelling. It is shown that by removing the native anomeric effect in this ligand family, one can tune chiral ligand shape and improve chiral bias. This concept is demonstrated by a combination of (i) x-ray crystallographic structure determination, (ii) assessment of catalytic performance, and (iii) consideration of the anomeric effect and its underlying dipolar basis. The title ligands were identified by a new mini version of the in situ enzymatic screening (ISES) procedure through which catalyst-ligand combinations are screened in parallel, and information on relative rate and enantioselectivity is obtained in real time, without the need to quench reactions or draw aliquots. Mini-ISES brings the technique into the nanomole regime (200 to 350 nmol catalyst/20 μml organic volume) commensurate with emerging trends in reaction development/process chemistry. The best-performing β-d-carbafructopyranosyl-1,2-diamine-derived salen ligand discovered here outperforms the best known organometallic and enzymatic catalysts for the hydrolytic kinetic resolution of 3-phenylpropylene oxide, one of several substrates examined for which the ligand is "matched." This ligand scaffold defines a new swath of chiral space, and anomeric effect tunability defines a new concept in shaping that chiral space. Both this ligand set and the anomeric shape-tuning concept are expected to find broad application, given the value of chiral 1,2-diamines and salens constructed from these in asymmetric catalysis.

Combining topology and sequence design for the discovery of potent antimicrobial peptide dendrimers against multidrug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Multidrug-resistant opportunistic bacteria, such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa, represent a major public health threat. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) and related peptidomimetic systems offer an attractive opportunity to control these pathogens. AMP dendrimers (AMPDs) with high activity against multidrug-resistant clinical isolates of P. aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumannii were now identified by a systematic survey of the peptide sequences within the branches of a distinct type of third-generation peptide dendrimers. Combined topology and peptide sequence design as illustrated here represents a new and general strategy to discover new antimicrobial agents to fight multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens.

Biophysical characterisation of calumenin as a charged F508del-CFTR folding modulator

The cystic fibrosis transmembrane regulator (CFTR) is a cyclic-AMP dependent chloride channel expressed at the apical surface of epithelial cells lining various organs such as the respiratory tract. Defective processing and functioning of this protein caused by mutations in the CFTR gene results in loss of ionic balance, defective mucus clearance, increased proliferation of biofilms and inflammation of human airways observed in cystic fibrosis (CF) patients. The process by which CFTR folds and matures under the influence of various chaperones in the secretory pathway remains incompletely understood. Recently, calumenin, a secretory protein, belonging to the CREC family of low affinity calcium binding proteins has been identified as a putative CFTR chaperone whose biophysical properties and functions remain uncharacterized. We compared hydropathy, instability, charge, unfoldability, disorder and aggregation propensity of calumenin and other CREC family members with CFTR associated chaperones and calcium binding proteins, wild-type and mutant CFTR proteins and intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs). We observed that calumenin, along with other CREC proteins, was significantly more charged and less folded compared to CFTR associated chaperones. Moreover like IDPs, calumenin and other CREC proteins were found to be less hydrophobic and aggregation prone. Phylogenetic analysis revealed a close link between calumenin and other CREC proteins indicating how evolution might have shaped their similar biophysical properties. Experimentally, calumenin was observed to significantly reduce F508del-CFTR aggregation in a manner similar to AavLEA1, a well-characterized IDP. Fluorescence microscopy based imaging analysis also revealed altered trafficking of calumenin in bronchial cells expressing F508del-CFTR, indicating its direct role in the pathophysiology of CF. In conclusion, calumenin is characterized as a charged protein exhibiting close similarity with IDPs and is hypothesized to regulate F508del-CFTR folding by electrostatic effects. This work provides useful insights for designing optimized synthetic structural correctors of CFTR mutant proteins in the future.

Imaging macrophages with nanoparticles

Nanomaterials have much to offer, not only in deciphering innate immune cell biology and tracking cells, but also in advancing personalized clinical care by providing diagnostic and prognostic information, quantifying treatment efficacy and designing better therapeutics. This Review presents different types of nanomaterial, their biological properties and their applications for imaging macrophages in human diseases, including cancer, atherosclerosis, myocardial infarction, aortic aneurysm, diabetes and other conditions. We anticipate that future needs will include the development of nanomaterials that are specific for immune cell subsets and can be used as imaging surrogates for nanotherapeutics. New in vivo imaging clinical tools for noninvasive macrophage quantification are thus ultimately expected to become relevant to predicting patients' clinical outcome, defining treatment options and monitoring responses to therapy.

Multivalent glycoconjugates as anti-pathogenic agents

Multivalency plays a major role in biological processes and particularly in the relationship between pathogenic microorganisms and their host that involves protein-glycan recognition. These interactions occur during the first steps of infection, for specific recognition between host and bacteria, but also at different stages of the immune response. The search for high-affinity ligands for studying such interactions involves the combination of carbohydrate head groups with different scaffolds and linkers generating multivalent glycocompounds with controlled spatial and topology parameters. By interfering with pathogen adhesion, such glycocompounds including glycopolymers, glycoclusters, glycodendrimers and glyconanoparticles have the potential to improve or replace antibiotic treatments that are now subverted by resistance. Multivalent glycoconjugates have also been used for stimulating the innate and adaptive immune systems, for example with carbohydrate-based vaccines. Bacteria present on their surfaces natural multivalent glycoconjugates such as lipopolysaccharides and S-layers that can also be exploited or targeted in anti-infectious strategies.

Peptide dendrimer/lipid hybrid systems are efficient DNA transfection reagents: structure--activity relationships highlight the role of charge distribution across dendrimer generations

Efficient DNA delivery into cells is the prerequisite of the genetic manipulation of organisms in molecular and cellular biology as well as, ultimately, in nonviral gene therapy. Current reagents, however, are relatively inefficient, and structure-activity relationships to guide their improvement are hard to come by. We now explore peptide dendrimers as a new type of transfection reagent and provide a quantitative framework for their evaluation. A collection of dendrimers with cationic and hydrophobic amino acid motifs (such as KK, KA, KH, KL, and LL) distributed across three dendrimer generations was synthesized by a solid-phase protocol that provides ready access to dendrimers in milligram quantities. In conjunction with a lipid component (DOTMA/DOPE), the best reagent, G1,2,3-KL ((LysLeu)8(LysLysLeu)4(LysLysLeu)2LysGlySerCys-NH2), improves transfection by 6-10-fold over commercial reagents under their respective optimal conditions. Emerging structure-activity relationships show that dendrimers with cationic and hydrophobic residues distributed in each generation are transfecting most efficiently. The trigenerational dendritic structure has an advantage over a linear analogue worth up to an order of magnitude. The success of placing the decisive cationic charge patterns in inner shells rather than previously on the surface of macromolecules suggests that this class of dendrimers significantly differs from existing transfection reagents. In the future, this platform may be tuned further and coupled to cell-targeting moieties to enhance transfection and cell specificity.

Glycopeptide dendrimers as Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilm inhibitors

Synthetic glycopeptide dendrimers composed of a branched oligopeptide tree structure appended with glycosidic groups at its multiple N-termini were investigated for binding to the Pseudomonas aeruginosa lectins LecB and LecA. These lectins are partly responsible for the formation of antibiotic resistant biofilms in the human pathogenic bacterium P. aeruginosa, which causes lethal airway infections in immune-compromised and cystic fibrosis patients. Glycopeptide dendrimers with high affinity to the lectins were identified by screening of combinatorial libraries. Several of these dendrimers, in particular the LecB specific glycopeptide dendrimers FD2 and D-FD2 and the LecA specific glycopeptide dendrimers GalAG2 and GalBG2, also efficiently block P. aeruginosa biofilm formation and induce biofilm dispersal in vitro. Structure-activity relationship and structural studies are reviewed, in particular the observation that multivalency is essential to the anti-biofilm effect in these dendrimers.

Peptide and glycopeptide dendrimer apple trees as enzyme models and for biomedical applications

Solid phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) provides peptides with a dendritic topology when diamino acids are introduced in the sequences. Peptide dendrimers with one to three amino acids between branches can be prepared with up to 38 amino acids (MW ~ 5,000 Da). Larger peptide dendrimers (MW ~ 30,000) were obtained by a multivalent chloroacetyl cysteine (ClAc) ligation. Structural studies of peptide dendrimers by CD, FT-IR, NMR and molecular dynamics reveal molten globule states containing up to 50% of α-helix. Esterase and aldolase peptide dendrimers displaying dendritic effects and enzyme kinetics (k(cat)/k(uncat) ~ 10(5)) were designed or discovered by screening large combinatorial libraries. Strong ligands for Pseudomonas aeruginosa lectins LecA and LecB able to inhibit biofilm formation were obtained with glycopeptide dendrimers. Efficient ligands for cobalamin, cytotoxic colchicine conjugates and antimicrobial peptide dendrimers were also developed showing the versatility of dendritic peptides. Complementing the multivalency, the amino acid composition of the dendrimers strongly influenced the catalytic or biological activity obtained demonstrating the importance of the "apple tree" configuration for protein-like function in peptide dendrimers.

Combinatorial discovery of peptide dendrimer enzyme models hydrolyzing isobutyryl fluorescein

Two 6750-membered one-bead-one-compound peptide dendrimer combinatorial libraries L (X(4))(8)(LysX(3))(4)(LysX(2))(2)LysX(1) (X(1-4) = 14 different amino acids or deletion, Lys = branching lysine residue) and AcL (with N-terminal acetylation) were prepared by split-and-mix solid phase peptide synthesis. Screening toward fluorogenic substrates for esterase and aldolase activities using the in silica off-bead assay (N. Maillard et al., J. Comb. Chem. 2009, 11, 667-675) and bead decoding by amino acid analysis revealed histidine containing sequences active against fluorescein diacetate. Isobutyryl fluorescein, a related hydrophobic fluorogenic substrate, was preferentially hydrolyzed by dendrimers from library AcL containing hydrophobic residues such as AcH3 (AcHis)(8)(LysLeu)(4)(LysVal)(2)LysLysOH, compared to simple oligohistidine peptides as reference catalysts. Polycationic dendrimers from library L with multiple free N-termini such as H8 (His)(8)(LysβAla)(4)(LysThr)(2)LysaProNH(2) (aPro = (2S,4S)-4-aminoproline) showed stronger reactivity toward 8-acetoxypyrene-1,3,6-trisulfonate with partial acylation of N-termini. These experiments highlight the role of noncatalytic amino acids to determine substrate selectivity in peptide dendrimer esterase models.

The proteome buccaneers: how to unearth your treasure chest via combinatorial peptide ligand libraries

The latest advances in combinatorial peptide ligand libraries, with their unique performance in discovering low-abundance species in proteomes, are reviewed here. Explanations of mechanism, potential applications, capture of proteomes at different pH values to enhance the total catch and quantitative elutions, such as boiling in the presence of 5% sodium dodecyl sulfate and 3% dithiothreitol are included. The reproducibility of protein capture among different experiments with the same batch of beads or with different batches is also reported to be very high, with coefficient of variations in the order of 10-20%. Miniaturized operations, consisting of capture with as little as 20 or even 5 microl of peptide beads are reported, thus demonstrating that the described technology could be exploited for routine biomarker discovery in a biomedical environment. Finally, it is shown that the signal of captured proteins is linear over approximately three orders of magnitude, ranging from nM to microM, thus ensuring that differential quantitative proteomics for biomarker discovery can be fully implemented, providing species do not saturate their ligands.

Glycopeptide dendrimer colchicine conjugates targeting cancer cells

Screening of a 65,536-member one-bead-one-compound (OBOC) combinatorial library of glycopeptide dendrimers of structure ((betaGal)(n)(+1)X(8)X(7)X(6)X(5))(2)DapX(4)X(3)X(2)X(1)(beta-Gal)(m) (betaGal=beta-galactosyl-thiopropionic acid, X(8-1)=variable amino acids, Dap=l-2,3-diaminopropionic acid, n, m=0, or 1 if X(8)=Lys resp. X(1)=Lys) for binding of Jurkat cells to the library beads in cell culture, resynthesis and testing lead to the identification of dendrimer J1 (betaGal-Gly-Arg-His-Ala)(2)Dap-Thr-Arg-His-Asp-CysNH(2) and related analogues as delivery vehicles. Cell targeting is evidenced by FACS with fluorescein conjugates such as J1F. The colchicine conjugate J1C is cytotoxic with LD(50)=1.5 microM. The beta-galactoside groups are necessary for activity, as evidenced by the absence of cell-binding and cytotoxicity in the non-galactosylated, acetylated analogue AcJ1F and AcJ1C, respectively. The pentagalactosylated dendrimer J4 betaGal(4)(Lys-Arg-His-Leu)(2)Dap-Thr-Tyr-His-Lys(betaGal)-Cys) selectively labels Jurkat cell as the fluorescein derivative J4F, but its colchicine conjugate J4C lacks cytotoxicity. Tubulin binding assays show that the colchicine dendrimer conjugates do not bind to tubulin, implying intracellular degradation of the dendrimers releasing the active drug.

Remote control of bipyridine-metal coordination within a peptide dendrimer

The metal coordinating ability of a bipyridine ligand at the core of a peptide dendrimer was found to be controlled by the nature of amino acids placed at the dendrimer periphery, with coordination being promoted by anionic residues and inhibited by cationic residues; heterotrimers with mixed charges were preferentially formed.