Tripeptide discriminations using circular dichroism detection

A general spectroscopic method is described that might be applied to validating amino acid sequences in peptides and protein fragments with a view to it becoming a routine procedure with which to characterize biotechnology drug products. The tripeptides are the L-enantiomers of GGA, GGH, GGI, GGL, GGF, GHG, LGG, and YGG. The simple procedure calls for their complexation with Cu(II) ion in strong aqueous base. Binding the first three residues in the sequence, beginning at the amine terminus, completes the coordination sphere of the Cu(II) ion, so duplication of the initial sequence from peptide to peptide could be an important limiting factor in determining the extent of differentiation that is possible. The analytical focus is the selectivity associated with the chirality properties of the peptides. Detection is by circular dichroism operating in the visible range. The eight analytes were chosen as representative of a series where the sequences are most similar and therefore potentially the most difficult to discriminate spectroscopically. All have just one chiral center. Using ellipticity data at all (n = 1500) wavelengths in the measured spectra, and two novel data reduction procedures, total discrimination among all eight analytes is achieved. The method has considerable potential for use in quality control of peptide and protein biotechnological drug forms, especially their enantiomeric purities.