New instrument provides high-throughput peptide synthesis

CRN’s Peptide Synthesis Core recently installed the CEM Multipep 2 Parallel Peptide Synthesizer, allowing the facility to offer three new high-throughput service lines.

Peptide Library Synthesis in 96-well plate format. This service enables the simultaneous synthesis of up to 384 peptides. This module is well-suited for initial screening efforts, diversity libraries, and early hit identification. Through a new partnership, the Peptide Synthesis Core can directly transfer peptides to Northwestern’s High Throughput Analysis Laboratory for further analysis.

Peptide Array Synthesis. This instrument can make up to 2,400 peptides attached to cellulose membranes (600 per membrane) for high-throughput screening. The peptides can then be screened similar to western blot membranes. This module is useful for epitope mapping, identifying protein-protein interaction sites, and positional scanning libraries for optimizing peptide leads, among other applications.

Parallel Small-Scale Peptide Synthesis. In this service, up to 72 peptides can be made in parallel on low mg scales (25 umol). Peptides can be provided in purified or unpurified form. This service is great for smaller, focused libraries, lead optimization, and structure-activity relationship (SAR) studies. It has also been useful for automated production of peptides with stable isotope-labeled amino acids and other expensive non-natural amino acids, as well as peptide nucleic acids (PNAs). 

“We’re really excited to roll out these new services the Multipep 2 supports because this instrument really expands the breadth of peptide synthesis options we can provide,” said Mark Karver, director of the Peptide Synthesis Core. “Our other synthesizers will continue to produce single targeted peptides as we always have, and the Multipep 2 will complement this nicely with the hundreds to thousands of diverse peptides it can make in parallel.”