An improved method for utilization of peptide substrates for antibody characterization and enzymatic assays

Synthetic peptides have become an important tool in antibody production and enzyme characterization. The small size of peptides, however, has hindered their use in assays systems, such as Western blots, and as immunogens. Here, we present a facile method to improve the properties of peptides for multiple applications by ligating the peptides to intein-generated carrier proteins. The stoichiometric ligation of peptide and carrier achieved by intein-mediated protein ligation (IPL) results in the ligation product migrating as a single band on a SDS-PAGE gel. The carrier proteins, HhaI methylase (M.HhaI) and maltose-binding protein (MBP), were ligated to various peptides; the ligated carrier-peptide products gave sharp, reproducible bands when used as positive controls for antibodies raised against the same peptides during Western blot analysis. We further show that ligation of the peptide antigens to a different thioester-tagged carrier protein, paramyosin, produced immunogens for the production of antisera in rabbits or mice. Furthermore, we demonstrate the generation of a substrate for enzymatic assays by ligating a peptide containing the phosphorylation site for Abl protein tyrosine kinase to a carrier protein. This carrier-peptide protein was used as a kinase substrate that could easily be tested for phosphorylation using a phosphotyrosine antibody in Western blot analysis. These techniques do not require sophisticated equipment, reagents, or skills thereby providing a simple method for research and development.