WBAWBA · Polymer conjugation of peptides/salmon calcitonin for increased efficacy

This project is concerned with the development of a new peptide conjugation strategy which has the potential to overcome the limitations of the, commercially successful, conventional pegylation with linear polymers. In addition it will explore the application of single electron transfer living radical polymerization (SET-LRP) for this purpose. Project Objectives 1. Synthesis and characterization of α-functional comb polymers by living radical polymerization 2. Hydrolysis studies of polymers and polymer conjugates 3. Evaluation of SET-LRP for synthesis of conjugates 4. Conjugation of polymers to salmon calcitonin 5. Purification and isolation of conjugates 6. Gastric peptide stability testing 7. Use of tryptic digestion to confirm conjugation site(s) 8. In vitro cAMP bio assays for sCT activity