Mimicry of tandem repeat peptides against cell surface carbohydrates

Our approach to multivalent peptide construction relies on tentacle peptides, also known as a multiple antigenic peptides, which contain two and four repeats of a selected peptide. In this communication, we report the results of preliminary studies aimed at (1) the selection of short peptides against the carbohydrate, sLeX, (2) the synthesis of tentacle dimers and tetramers of the selected peptides, and (3) the determination of affinities and specificities of the peptides to several related carbohydrates by using the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) and the equilibrium dialysis techniques. Binding affinity studies, as well as assays of in vitro binding of the peptides to a sLeX-specific cell line, have shown that the tetrameric peptides bind to the cell surface sugars.