A perfluoroaromatic abiotic analog of H2 relaxin enabled by rapid flow-based peptide synthesis

Org Biomol Chem. 2016 Apr 7;14(13):3345-9. doi: 10.1039/c6ob00208k. Epub 2016 Mar 8.

Abstract

H2 relaxin is a pleiotropic peptide hormone with clinical potential. Here we report on the reaction and use of hexafluorobenzene as an intramolecular disulfide replacement between Cys10 and Cys15 in the A-chain of H2 relaxin. Using flow-based Fmoc solid-phase peptide synthesis methodology we were able to obtain high-quality H2 relaxin fragments that were previously reported as challenging to synthesize. Subsequent native chemical ligation and oxidative folding enabled total synthesis of both wild type H2 relaxin and a C6F4 linked analog. Cell-based activity assays revealed modest activity for the C6F4 linked H2 relaxin analog, albeit 100-fold reduced relative to wild type. This work demonstrates how perfluoroarylation-cysteine SNAr chemistry may be a useful tool for the selective replacement of native disulfide bonds in proteins.

Publication types

  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Fluorocarbons / chemistry*
  • Hydrogen / chemistry*
  • Models, Molecular
  • Molecular Structure
  • Relaxin / analogs & derivatives*
  • Relaxin / chemical synthesis*
  • Relaxin / chemistry

Substances

  • Fluorocarbons
  • Hydrogen
  • Relaxin
  • hexafluorobenzene