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Peptide Identity And Research Origin — 2026 Update

By Editorial Desk · published 2026-05-30 · last reviewed 2026-07-08 · Topic

The short version of HPLC purity fits in a sentence. The long version — which is the one that helps — is below.

This page was last updated on 2026-07-08 and is reviewed periodically as new material appears.

Peptide Identity and Research Origin

The published literature is dominated by a small number of research groups, much of it in Russian-language journals, and independent replication outside those groups is limited. Studies are typically small, use cultured cells or rodent models, and report endpoints that differ between papers, which makes comparison difficult. Large randomised human trials have not appeared in the indexed literature. Questions about absorption, distribution and clearance are therefore still treated as open in reviews that mention the compound.

Epitalon is a synthetic tetrapeptide with the sequence alanine–glutamate–aspartate–glycine, commonly abbreviated AEDG. Its design traces to epithalamin, a peptide fraction prepared from bovine pineal gland extracts that researchers in Saint Petersburg began investigating in the 1970s. The compound has a molecular formula of C14H22N4O9 and a nominal molecular mass near 390 daltons. It holds no approved drug status in the United States or the European Union, and material sold under this name is generally offered as a research chemical rather than a finished pharmaceutical product.

Proposed mechanisms centre on cell-culture observations rather than a defined receptor interaction. Several reports describe increased expression of the telomerase catalytic subunit after exposure of cultured human cells, and the authors attributed the effect to short peptide fragments entering the nucleus and influencing gene transcription. No receptor for the tetrapeptide has been identified, and the free peptide is expected to be degraded rapidly by plasma peptidases. Whether any measurable fraction reaches intact tissues after administration remains an unresolved question rather than an established finding.

Structure, Naming and Discovery

The compound is generally described as a synthetic analogue of a fragment isolated from a pineal gland extract. Researchers associated with the Saint Petersburg Institute of Bioregulation and Gerontology introduced it during the 1980s and 1990s while studying short peptides from animal tissue. The original extract, called epithalamin, is a heterogeneous mixture, whereas epitalon is a single defined sequence. That distinction matters because findings reported for the extract are not automatically findings about the pure tetrapeptide, and claims about broader biological effects remain a separate question from the chemical identity described here.

Residue composition is the property that most cleanly separates verified material from mislabelled samples. Alanine, glutamate, aspartate and glycine appear in that order from the N-terminus, and the two acidic residues sit in the middle of the chain. Because the peptide is short, it can be produced by solid-phase synthesis and characterised by mass spectrometry without ambiguity. Any reported sample whose measured mass departs substantially from 390 daltons is a different compound or a degraded mixture rather than epitalon.

Epitalon at a glance

PropertyValueNotes
Molecular formulaC14H22N4O9Synthetic tetrapeptide, four residues
Nominal massApproximately 390 DaFree peptide; salt forms differ
AppearanceWhite to off-white powderCommonly supplied lyophilised
Solubility classFreely soluble in waterAlso dissolves in aqueous buffer
Typical storage−20 °C, desiccatedCold packs used during transport

Peptide Identity and Laboratory Handling

Storage recommendations center on limiting moisture, heat, and light. The dry powder is generally kept at minus 20 degrees Celsius, and some suppliers recommend minus 80 degrees for long-term archival. Once dissolved, solutions are usually aliquoted and frozen to avoid repeated freeze-thaw cycles, which can promote aggregation or degradation. Aqueous stability depends on pH and concentration, and buffered saline is often preferred over plain water for biological work. Stability data specific to epitalon remain limited, so general peptide-handling practices are applied by analogy rather than from product-specific validation.

Epitalon is a synthetic tetrapeptide with the sequence alanine-glutamate-aspartate-glycine, abbreviated AEDG. Its molecular formula is C14H22N4O9 and its calculated monoisotopic mass is approximately 390.35 daltons. The compound does not occur naturally as a free peptide; it is produced by solid-phase peptide synthesis. Because it contains two acidic residues and no basic residues, the neutral form carries a net negative charge at physiological pH. This charge profile influences how the peptide behaves in solution and during chromatographic analysis.

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Background from the literature

== Apolipoprotein H involvement == β2-glycoprotein I has been identified as apolipoprotein H and is required for the recognition of ACA in autoimmune disease. Only a subset of autoimmune anti-cardiolipin antibodies bind Apo-H, these anti-apolipoprotein antibodies are associated with increased thrombosis.

=== Microscopy === Other microscopy techniques are commonly used in tandem with NanoSIMS that allow for multiple types of information to be obtained, such as taxonomic information through fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) or identification of additional physiological or microstructural features via transmission electron microscopy (TEM) or scanning electron microscopy (SEM).

==== Effects ==== RO5203648 has been found to increase the firing rate of ventral tegmental area (VTA) dopaminergic neurons and dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN) serotonergic neurons in mouse brain slices ex vivo. This is in contrast to the TAAR1 full agonist RO5166017, which suppresses their firing rates, but is analogous to the TAAR1 antagonist EPPTB, which dramatically increases their firing rates. RO5203648 failed to show these effects in the neurons of TAAR1 knockout mice, indicating that its actions are mediated by interactions with the TAAR1. RO5203648 alone does not affect electrically evoked dopamine release or reuptake (as measured by tau) in rat nucleus accumbens (NAc) slices ex vivo. Conversely, RO5203648 prevented cocaine-induced dopamine elevations in this system without affecting the dopamine reuptake inhibition of cocaine. As such, its inhibition of cocaine's dopaminergic actions is likely to be independent of dopamine transporter (DAT) interactions. RO5203648 did not affect methamphetamine-induced dopamine efflux or reuptake inhibition in rat striatal synaptosomes in vitro. However, RO5203648 blunted and delayed methamphetamine-induced dopamine elevations in the NAc in rodents in vivo. Hence, as with cocaine, RO5203648's regulation of methamphetamine's actions appears to be independent of DAT interactions. Some in-vitro studies have suggested that TAAR1 agonism by amphetamines and β-phenethylamine may mediate induction of monoamine release and reuptake inhibition by these agents.

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Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Further detail

== Recent developments == Improvements in structural alignment methods constitute an active area of research, and new or modified methods are often proposed that are claimed to offer advantages over the older and more widely distributed techniques. A recent example, TM-align, uses a novel method for weighting its distance matrix, to which standard dynamic programming is then applied. The weighting is proposed to accelerate the convergence of dynamic programming and correct for effects arising from alignment lengths. In a benchmarking study, TM-align has been reported to improve in both speed and accuracy over DALI and CE. Other promising methods of structural alignment are local structural alignment methods. These provide comparison of pre-selected parts of proteins (e.g. binding sites, user-defined structural motifs) against binding sites or whole-protein structural databases. The MultiBind and MAPPIS servers allow the identification of common spatial arrangements of physicochemical properties such as H-bond donor, acceptor, aliphatic, aromatic or hydrophobic in a set of user provided protein binding sites defined by interactions with small molecules (MultiBind) or in a set of user-provided protein–protein interfaces (MAPPIS). Others provide comparison of entire protein structures against a number of user submitted structures or against a large database of protein structures in reasonable time (ProBiS).

As his presidency came to a close, the country experienced a financial crisis, resulting in the Great Recession, prompting his administration and Congress to push through emergency economic measures aimed at stabilizing the financial system, including the Troubled Asset Relief Program. After his second term, Bush returned to Texas, where he has maintained a low public profile. At various points in his presidency, he was both among the most popular and among the least popular presidents in U.S. history. He received the highest recorded approval ratings in the wake of the September 11 attacks, and one of the lowest ratings during the 2008 financial crisis. Bush left office as one of the most unpopular U.S. presidents; however, public opinion of him has improved in his post-presidency. Scholars and historians generally rank Bush as a below-average president.

In 1944, Oswald Avery, working at the Rockefeller Institute of New York, demonstrated that genes are made up of DNA (see Avery–MacLeod–McCarty experiment). In 1952, Alfred Hershey and Martha Chase confirmed that the genetic material of the bacteriophage, the virus which infects bacteria, is made up of DNA (see Hershey–Chase experiment). In 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick published a paper about the discovery of the double helical structure of the DNA molecule based on the discoveries made by Rosalind Franklin. In 1961, François Jacob and Jacques Monod demonstrated that the products of certain genes regulated the expression of other genes by acting upon specific sites at the edge of those genes. They also hypothesized the existence of an intermediary between DNA and its protein products, which they called messenger RNA. Between 1961 and 1965, the relationship between the information contained in DNA and the structure of proteins was determined: there is a code, the genetic code, which creates a correspondence between the succession of nucleotides in the DNA sequence and a series of amino acids in proteins. In April 2023, scientists, based on new evidence, concluded that Rosalind Franklin was a contributor and "equal player" in the discovery process of DNA, rather than otherwise, as may have been presented subsequently after the time of the discovery. The chief discoveries of molecular biology took place in a period of only about twenty-five years.

== Physical properties == The melting point of cerebrosides is considerably greater than physiological body temperature, >37.0 °C, giving glycolipids a paracrystalline, similar to liquid crystal structure. Cerebroside molecules are able form up to eight intermolecular hydrogen bonds between the polar hydrogens of the sugar and the hydroxy and amide groups of the sphingosine base of the ceramide. These hydrogen bonds within the cerebrosides result in the molecules having a high transition temperature and compact alignment. Monoglycosylceramides in conjunction with cholesterol are prevalent in the lipid-raft micro domain, which are important sites in the binding of proteins, and enzyme-receptor interactions.

== Phosphinic peptides == Phosphinic peptides are pseudo-peptides where a phosphinic acid bond (PO2-CH-) has replaced a peptide bond in the peptide analogue sequence. To some extent the chemical structure of phosphinic peptides is similar to that of intermediates which are produced in hydrolysis of peptides by proteolytic enzymes. The hypothesis has been made that these pseudo-peptides mimic the structure of the enzyme substrates in their transition state and crystallography of zinc proteases in complex with phosphinic peptides supports that hypothesis.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Frequently asked questions

Is epitalon the same as epithalamin?

No. Epithalamin is a heterogeneous peptide fraction obtained from pineal gland extract and contains many components. Epitalon is a single synthetic tetrapeptide with the sequence Ala-Glu-Asp-Gly. Researchers synthesised the shorter peptide while attempting to identify active sequences within the extract.

Does epitalon occur naturally in the human body?

No endogenous peptide with this exact sequence has been described as a circulating hormone or signalling molecule. The tetrapeptide was designed as a synthetic analogue based on fragments observed in pineal preparations. Any activity discussed in the literature therefore refers to administered material rather than to a natural pool of the compound.

What regulatory category does epitalon fall into?

It is not an approved medicine in major jurisdictions and does not appear in the major pharmacopoeias. Material is usually distributed as a research chemical or laboratory reagent. Such labelling places handling responsibility on the purchaser and does not indicate that a regulatory body has reviewed the substance.

What is epitalon made of?

It is a four-amino-acid peptide built from alanine, glutamate, aspartate and glycine in that order. Its formula is C14H22N4O9, and it is made by chemical synthesis rather than extracted from tissue. The synthetic peptide is a single defined molecule, unlike the pineal extracts it is often compared with.

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