Chemical Synthesis of Peptides

Proteins and peptides are complex organic molecules that have an important role in the living organism because they act as enzymes, hormones, and building blocks of the human body. Peptides and proteins can be obtained from different sources, including natural products, chemical synthesis, semi-synthesis, and recombinant-DNA technologies. The area of food bioactive proteins and peptides is a rapidly growing field of study. No doubt more bioactive peptides and proteins along with their pharmacological effects will be discovered in the future, as the molecular biology and biochemistry research in synthetic peptides that are being chemically synthesized and carefully engineered grows in intensity. Hence, this chapter is designed to cover all the aspects involved in the chemical synthesis of peptides. Methods such as solid-phase peptide synthesis (SPPS), native chemical ligation, and α-ketoacid hydroxylamine ligation are discussed. SPPS, for instance, has emerged as a powerful and efficient technique for the chemical synthesis of peptides. Due to the advent of new tools like SPPS and reagents in the chemical synthesis of peptides – especially in chemical ligation methods – it is now possible to synthesize difficult peptides.