Amino Acids and Peptides in Ball Milling - Ball Milling Towards Green Synthesis: Applications, Projects, Challenges - page 114

CHAPTER 6
Amino Acids and Peptides in
Ball Milling y
THOMAS-XAVIER M ´ TRO, EVELINA COLACINO,
JEAN MARTINEZ AND FR ´ D ´ RIC LAMATY*
Institut des Biomol ´ cules Max Mousseron, UMR 5247 CNRS-UM1-UM2-
ENSCM, Universit´ Montpellier 2, Place E. Bataillon, 34095 Montpellier
Cedex 5, France
*Email: [e-mail]
6.1 Introduction
For many years, pharmaceutical companies have focused their attention on
the development of drugs based on the biological activity of small molecules.
More recently, peptides have been recognized as ecient active pharma-
ceutical ingredients and new delivery systems have moved them forward in the
modern therapeutic arsenal. Peptides also serve as pharmacological tools. 1
Peptides have many advantages over small drugs, the major ones being
their high potency and selectivity. They can also be investigated over a broad
range of targets, providing generally a better binding with fewer side-effects
and avoiding accumulation in tissues. Moreover, at a time when small drugs
and their metabolites have been recognized as pollutants in the environ-
ment, peptides are considered as less eco-toxic since their degradation
pathways in nature lead to the generation of more innocuous molecules
such as amino acids. 2
y The contribution of Thomas-Xavier M´tro and Evelina Colacino to this work is equivalent.