This thorough book aims to present the methods that have enabled the success of peptides and proteins in a wide variety of applications. It opens with a section on chemical tools applied to the production or engineering of peptides and proteins, and concludes with a collection of chapters on biological approaches used to engineer structure and function in peptides and proteins. As a book in the Springer Protocols Handbooks series, chapters include the kind of detailed descriptions and tips necessary for successful results in practice. Authoritative and practical, Peptide and Protein Engineering: From Concepts to Biotechnological Applications will be of great use to scientists in academia and industry seeking a better understanding of the emerging principles and methodologies in peptide and protein engineering.

Peptides and proteins are crucial biomolecules in life. The manifold functions they carry out range from molecular recognition and signaling to catalysis and immune response. However, the native systems are limited to a reduced toolbox of chemical functionalities as well as tridimensional structures. Widening these toolboxes could pave the way to engineer peptides and proteins with enhanced properties compared to their native counterparts and/or with structures and functions unprecedented in Nature. Advances in the chemical and biological synthesis of peptides and proteins, in computational tools, in molecular biology and in high-throughput screening methods are making this realm possible.This book aims to give an overview of the last developments in the field of peptide and protein engineering. It comprises a collection of chapters that span from the production of simple non-proteinogenic building blocks and peptidic scaffolds of different sizes and structures to more complex systems including peptide-based nanomaterials, enzymes and artificial metalloenzymes. Different strategies are described where chemical and biological tools have been developed and combined to attain the desired properties and sought functionalities.The diverse systems described in this book highlight the progress in this important field and represent the starting points for the development of functional biomolecules, biomaterials and hybrid systems capable of addressing key societal challenges of our times in relevant areas such health, environment and energy.

Site-specific mutagenesis of DNA, developed some thirty years ago, has proven to be one of the most important advances in biology. By allowing the site-specific replacement of any amino acid in a protein with one of the other nineteen amino acids, it ushered in the new era of "Protein Engineering". The field of protein engineering has, however, evolved rapidly since then and the last fifteen years have witnessed remarkable advances through the use of new chemical, biochemical and molecular biological tools towards the synthesis and manipulation of proteins. The chapters included in this book reflect the rapid evolution of protein engineering and its many applications in basic research, biotechnology, material sciences and therapy. This book will provide the reader with an introduction to state-of the-art concepts and methods and will be of use to anyone interested in the study of proteins, in academia as well as in industry.

Peptides serve as effective drugs in the clinic today. However the inherent drawbacks of peptide structures can limit their efficacy as drugs. To overcome this researchers are developing new methods to create ‘tailor-made’ peptides and proteins with improved pharmacological properties. Design of Peptides and Proteins provides an overview of the experimental and computational methods for peptide and protein design, with an emphasis on specific applications for therapeutics and biomedical research. Topics covered include: Computer modeling of peptides and proteins Peptidomimetics Design and synthesis of cyclic peptides Carbohydrates in peptide and protein design De novo design of peptides and proteins Medical development applications An extended case study – the design of insulin variants Design of Peptides and Proteins presents the state-of-the-art of this exciting approach for therapeutics, with contributions from international experts. It is an essential resource for academic and industrial scientists in the fields of peptide and protein drug design, biomedicine, biochemistry, biophysics, molecular modelling, synthetic organic chemistry and medicinal/pharmaceutical chemistry.

The design and production of novel peptides and proteins occupy pivotal positions in science and technology and will continue to do so in the 21st century. Protein Engineering and Design outlines the rapid advances in computer-based modeling, protein engineering, and methods needed for protein and peptide preparation and characterization. This indispensable reference lays the groundwork for understanding this multidisciplinary activity while providing an introduction for researchers and students to the field of protein design. Introduces and defines the techniques involved in protein engineering and design Provides a concise overview of key technologies involved and demonstrates their contributions to the specialized design and production of novel proteins and peptides

Protein Engineering: Applications in Science, Medicine, and Industry deals with the scientific, medical, and industrial applications of protein engineering. Topics range from protein structure and design to mutant analysis and complex systems. Applications such as production of novel antibiotics, genetic transformation of plants, and genetic engineering of bioinsecticides are described. This book is comprised of 25 chapters and begins with an overview of trends and developments in protein chemistry and their relevance to protein engineering, followed by a discussion on protein sequence data banks. Subsequent chapters explore the design and construction of biologically active peptides, including hormones; structural and functional analysis of thermophile proteins; the conformation of diphtheria toxin; and applications of surface-simulation synthesis in protein molecular recognition. The use of oligonucleotide-directed site-specific mutagenesis in functional analysis of the signal peptide for protein secretion is also considered. The results of studies on the mechanism of membrane fusion are presented. This monograph will serve as a useful guide for those who are already working on protein engineering and those who are about to start research in this field.

As genomics gives way to proteomics as the focus of scientific imagination in the biological sciences, more emphasis will be placed on the technology and interpretation of protein engineering experiments. Protein engineers will become increasingly sophisticated in the questions that they pose and demanding of the tools available to change protein structure. The optimal way to introduce non-coded amino acids for mechanistic studies, or site-specific reporter atoms for spectroscopic structural biology, is by protein semisynthesis. In Protein Engineering by Semisynthesis, the leading practitioners of the method cover their individual protein of expertise forming a comprehensive illustration of the various methods developed. By covering the most recent philosophical and methodological approaches and developments of semisynthesis and peptide synthesis to date, this book provides further understanding of the principles of protein structure-function relationships gained from semisynthetic analog in addition to providing a comprehensive and comprehensible laboratory guide. This book focuses on recent developments which synergistically combine chemical and molecular biological techniques that have made semisynthetic manipulations much easier to undertake. Features