Figure 1.

Schematic illustration of our concept for screening for ECM-selective (extracellular matrix) adhesion peptides. The method is divided into two sequential steps. The first step involves in silico screening of tripeptides. Peptide sequences are categorized according to 13 amino acid indices and are clustered in silico into 50 groups of physicochemically similar peptides. Ten representative peptides are then selected from each cluster. In the second step, these representative sequences are synthesized on the candidate array. In our assay for detecting ECM-selective peptides, microarray intensities indicate the normalized, relative strengths of protein adhesion to Col IV (collagen type), Col I, and Alb. Finally, the results are analyzed to identify Col IV-selective adhesion peptides.