Prediction of location of active sites in biologically active peptides.

In a previous paper we demonstrated that the short-range compact regions in atrial natriuretic factor (alpha-hANF) predicted by the average distance map (ADM) correspond to its active sites [Kikuchi, J. Protein Chem. 11, 579-581 (1992)]. In the present paper we apply the same method to other bioactive peptides and peptidic enzyme inhibitors. We again observe that active sites in each peptide are contained in short-range compact regions predicted by the ADM for the peptide. This demonstrates that the ADM method predicts the possible location of active sites in biologically active peptides in general. The possibility of practical application of the present method to rational drug design is also discussed.