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Updated: May 24, 2026

Enzymatic Cascade Reactions for the Synthesis of Chiral Amino Alcohols from L-lysine
Published on: February 16, 2018
Chemoenzymatic synthesis of poly(L-alanine) in aqueous environment
Peter James Baker1, Keiji Numata
1Enzyme Research Team, RIKEN Biomass Engineering Program, RIKEN, Wako-shi, Saitama, Japan.
Abstract:
L-alanine ethyl ester was polymerized into poly(L-alanine) (polyAla), one of the insoluble polypeptides, by papain in aqueous buffer at varying pH. At neutral pH, a maximum chain length of 11 repeats was observed. These polymers were dominated by random coiled structure and demonstrated a lack of patterned macromolecular assembly. Under alkaline conditions, longer polymer chain lengths were achieved, and the maximum chain length was 16 repeats. These longer chains showed distinct β-sheet formation and were capable of fibril assembly. The present study reports on chemoenzymatic synthesis of a hydrophobic homopolypeptide under aqueous conditions as well as demonstrates a chain length dependency of secondary structure formation and macromolecular assembly of chemoenzymatically synthesized polyAla, providing a new insight into material design of polypeptide.
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