细胞穿膜肽的研究进展

Advances in Cell-Penetrating Peptides

细胞穿膜肽是一类能携带大分子物质进入细胞的短肽,其穿膜能力不依赖经典的胞吞作用。经过对天然存在的细胞穿膜肽的生物化学性质研究,已经逐渐掌握了细胞穿膜肽的一些共有特性,这类物质均为带有正电荷的长短不等的多肽片段,其中富含精氨酸、赖氨酸等碱性氨基酸残基,二级结构皆具有α-螺旋的空间构象。利用这些特性,目前已人工合成了穿透力更强、效率更高的穿膜肽PEP-1、MPG,并且成功地携带大分子物质进入细胞发挥生物学活性。

Cell-penetrating peptides（CPP） are small peptides that are able to ferry much larger molecules into cells independent of classical endocytosis. Through the recent study of natural existing CPP, the generally mechanism by which this internalization takes place has been described partly. CPP are basic amino acid-riched polypeptides, a part of this domain can be folded in an α-helix structure with amphipathic characteristics. PEP-1 and MPG which were designed on the basis of these properties can constitute a powerful tool for the delivery of active protein or other biomacromolecules both in cultured cells and in vivo, without requiring any covalent coupling, which provide a more efficient strategy for gene therapy.