Peptor - Using SCAPLs To Optimize Drug Discovery

Israeli biopharmaceutical company Peptor, established in 1993, has gonefrom strength to strength in its first four years, concentrating on drug discovery and optimization and the manufacture of Small Cyclic Analogs of Peptide Loops-based drugs.

The strategy that underlies the company is the use of combinatorial chemistry to generate cyclic analogs of the small peptide loops that comprise the biologically active parts of large proteins and peptides. It refers to these compounds, which are modified peptides arranged in a cyclic structure plus certain non-peptide chemicals, as SCAPLs.

Small peptide loops are the active part of the protein, with the remainder acting as a "scaffold" to retain the loops in their specific three-dimensional conformation. SCAPLs mimic the active conformation of the small peptide loops and render the large protein scaffold redundant. Peptor believes that these may provide advantages over large proteins as drugs.