SpheriTech resins in GEN

from Genetic Engineering News
1st July 2011
Link: http://genengnews.com/gen-articles/strategies-for-optimizing-peptide-synthesis/3722/
 

In June, SpheriTech  introduced SpheriTide™, a polymer support for solid-phase peptide synthesis. These polymeric microspheres are composed of peptides, specifically ε-lysine residues cross-linked with multi-functional carboxylic acids.

The first version of SpheriTide offered commercially uses sebacic acid as the cross-linking agent, which forms what the company describes as a “quasi-homogeneous peptide gel network with excellent salvation characteristics, akin to those of the growing peptide chains.”

In the SpheriTide polymer, amide bonds form between the α carboxyl and ε amino groups of lysine, whereas typical peptide bonds form between the α carboxyl and α amino groups of two linked amino acids.

The relatively low cost of poly-ε-lysine, an FDA-approved food ingredient that is commercially available at high purity in bulk scale—produced by bacterial fermentation—gives SpheriTide “the potential, with economies of scale, to be cheaper than polystyrene,” said Don Wellings, Ph.D., founder and CEO of SpheriTech.

He described the ability of the resin’s microporous polymers to swell and solvate and to provide many of the favorable qualities of traditional polystyrene-based support materials. Compared to some new, more hydrophilic support materials, such as polyethylene glycol-based resins, SpheriTide microspheres are not sticky and do not adhere to reactor walls. The cross-linked poly-ε-lysine is biodegradable, with complete enzymatic degradation yielding the polymer’s amino acid components.

The new solid support has resulted in improved product quality and quantity compared to traditional methods for all test peptides synthesized to date by SpheriTech, Dr. Wellings reported.