A novel delivery platform for therapeutic peptides.

Abstract

Although many peptides have therapeutic effects against diverse disease, their

short half-lives in vivo hurdle their application as drug candidates. To extend

the short elimination half-lives of therapeutic peptides, we developed a novel

delivery platform for therapeutic peptides using an anti-hapten antibody and its

corresponding hapten. We selected cotinine because it is non-toxic, has a

well-studied metabolism, and is physiologically absent. We conjugated WKYMVm-NH2,

an anti-sepsis therapeutic peptide, to cotinine and showed that the conjugated

peptide in complex with an anti-cotinine antibody has a significantly improved in

vivo half-life while retaining its therapeutic efficacy. We suggest that this

novel delivery platform for therapeutic peptides will be very useful to develop

effective peptide therapeutics.