1 Institute of Biostructures and Bioimaging, Italian National Research Council (IBB-CNR), Via P. Castel-lino 111, 80131 Naples, Italy; rosanna.palumbo@cnr.it; giovanni.roviello@cnr.it 2 Yerevan State University, 1 Alex Manoogian Str., 0025 Yerevan, Armenia; hayarpi.simonyan@ysu.am * Correspondence: giovanni.roviello@cnr.it; Tel.: +390812203415
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Advances in Amino Acid-based Chemistry
Peptide-based therapies are of great importance in biomedicine for the treatment of pathologies with enormous societal impact, including cancer, neurodegeneration, and viral diseases, such as the COVID-19. Peptides can interact with biological macromolecules involved in important bi-ological pathways such as proteins and nucleic acids. Furthermore, once functionalized by DNA nucleic bases, they become powerful tools for targeting DNA and RNA, as evidenced by the sci-entific literature on peptide nucleic acids and nucleopeptides, endowed with a huge diagnostic and therapeutic potential. Moreover, peptide analogs of a different nature, with self-assembly properties leading to supramolecular assemblies and nanocomposites, are attracting increasing attention in nanomedicine and biotechnology. Peptides find also application in vaccines and cosmetics for sensitive skins. Herein, we focus on novel strategies using amino acid-derivatives and peptides whose development can improve the overall knowledge of amino acid-based chemistry at the interface between nanotechnology and human health-oriented applications.