THE TASP CONCEPT - MIMETICS OF PEPTIDE LIGANDS, PROTEIN SURFACES AND FOLDING UNITS

The TASP (Template Assembled Synthetic Protein) concept in protein de novo design has been introduced for the construction of protein-like m olecules exhibiting tailor made functional properties. After establish ing some synthetic and conformational foundations in TASP strategy, we describe a 4alpha - helix bundle TASP molecule mimicking immunologica l properties of human MHC-I. Furthermore, we focus on structural motif s (eg. topological templates) disposing functional groups in defined s patial positions as candidates to mimic structural and conformational features of peptides and proteins for molecular recognition studies.