Immune and mitochondrial peptides
Immune and mitochondrial peptides: 5 articles from Peptides Facts. Evidence-led reference on research peptides.
Humanin and the Mitochondrial-Derived Peptide Family
Humanin was found by accident in a screen of brain tissue from an Alzheimer's patient, and it turned out to be encoded inside the mitochondrial genome. It opened a family of short peptides read from mitochondrial DNA, and almost every quantitative claim about them rests on assays that are difficult to trust.
KPV: A Tripeptide From the C-Terminus of Alpha-MSH
KPV is the last three residues of alpha-melanocyte-stimulating hormone. It keeps most of the parent hormone's anti-inflammatory activity and loses the pigmentary activity entirely, because the receptor-binding core sits elsewhere in the sequence. Nearly all of the evidence is preclinical.
LL-37: The Human Cathelicidin
LL-37 is the only cathelicidin humans make. It kills bacteria by physically disrupting their membranes, signals to immune cells through a formyl peptide receptor, and is transcriptionally controlled by vitamin D. It is also a case study in why antimicrobial peptides keep failing in clinical development.
SS-31 and Elamipretide: Binding Cardiolipin
SS-31 is a four-residue peptide that concentrates in the inner mitochondrial membrane without a transporter and binds cardiolipin, the lipid that gives cristae their shape. Its mechanism was substantially rewritten after its first decade, and its clinical trial record includes several clear failures.
Thymosin Alpha-1: Immunomodulation and Why It Is Not TB-500
Thymosin alpha-1 and thymosin beta-4 are unrelated peptides that share a name because they came off the same chromatography column in the 1970s. One is a licensed immunomodulator in about thirty countries. The other is the parent of TB-500.