Instalation Map

The Peptide and Peptide-Nucleic Acids Synthesis Facility (POP-UP) of the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Porto is settled at the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and is devoted, since the beginning of 2016, to the synthesis of peptides and peptide-nucleic acids (PNA) on demand.

The mission of POP-UP is to deliver to the scientific and technological community (academic, corporate and others), in particular within the Northern Portugal region, a service of excellence in peptide and PNA synthesis, purification and analysis, taking advantage of state-of-the-art equipment available and of the know-how and long-term expertise of the team. 

The POP-UP team integrates experts in solution/solid-phase peptide and PNA synthesis, analytical and preparative high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) techniques for peptide and PNA analysis and purification, as well as mass spectrometry techniques of relevance in the context of peptide and PNA analysis and proteomics. Additional information can be obtained through the phone or e-mail contacts given below.  

Users

Access to the services of the POP-UP facility will be granted to:

• Researchers from Private or Public Institutes and Academia, Companies and other Organisms, through placement of orders through the e-mail address available under “Contacts” (see below). Orders must be preceded by request, also throught the same e-mail address, of the corresponding quote, which will be emitted by the Head of the Service.

Services available

• Solid-phase peptide and PNA synthesis at room temperature or assisted with either microwave or infrared radiation;
• Solution-phase peptide synthesis;
• Peptide and PNA purification by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) at preparative scale;
• Peptide and PNA analysis by high performance liquid chromatography with diode array detection (HPLC-DAD);
• Peptide and PNA analysis by electrospray ionization-ion trap mass spectrometry (ESI-IT MS) either via direct injection or coupled to liquid chromatography (LC/MS);
• Peptide and PNA quantitation by microvolume spectrophotometry - partnership with ICETA;
• Peptide and PNA quantitation by amino acid analysis (AAA) - available soon;
• Consultancy in Peptide Chemistry.

Equipments available

    1) from FCUP

• 24-channel multiplex synthesizer "Symphony X", from Protein Technologies Inc., with the option of infrared-assisted synthesis;
• Microwave-assisted solid-phase synthesis instrument "Liberty 1", from CEM;
• Analytical HPLC-DAD system Merck-Hitachi LaChrom Elite;
• Preparative HPLC system Merck-Hitachi LaPrep Sigma;
• LC/MS system Finnigan Surveyor LCQ DECA XP MAX, from Thermo Electron Corporation;
• Amino acid analysis system using the Waters AccQ-Tag® method - available soon.

    2) in partnership with ICETA

• Microvolume spectrophotometer "NanoDrop™ One", da ThermoFischer Scientific, allowing quantitation of peptides lacking amino acids absorbing at 280 nm.

Special services

It will be possible to perform analyses, in collaboration with Mass Spectrometry Laboratory of the Materials Centre of the University of Porto, through the following techniques:

• HPLC-DAD coupled to high resolution mass spectrometry (HRMS) using ESI-IT, on an LTQ Orbitrap XL instrument from Thermo Scientific;
• Matrix-assisted laser dessorption ionization - time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI TOF/TOF), on a Daltonics UltrafleXtreme system from Bruker.