Structure-activity relationship of a series of antioxidant tripeptides derived from β-Lactoglobulin using QSAR modeling

Antioxidative peptides derived from food proteins have been screened and characterized in in vitro assays, and several quantitative structure–activity relationship (QSAR) models have been established to understand the structure–activity relationship of the selected antioxidant peptides. However, a systematic evaluation of each fragment that could be produced by a certain protein is still lacking. In this study, all the tripeptides that could possibly derive from bovine beta-lactoglobulin based on its amino acid sequence have been synthesized, and their antioxidant activities were measured using a ferric-reducing antioxidant power assay. Three of the peptides (i.e., LTC, CQC, and GTW) exhibited higher activities than that of glutathione. A QSAR model was also computed using multiple linear regression with divided physicochemical property scores descriptors, and the validity of the model was confirmed by cross-validation and Y-scrambling. The result of the QSAR modeling indicated that the electronic and hydrogen-bonding properties of the amino acids in the tripeptide sequences, as well as the steric properties of the amino acid residues at the C- and N-termini, played an important role in the antioxidant activities of the tripeptides. The antioxidant activities of the tripeptides were generally higher with Cys and Trp amino acid residues in the sequence. The structural characteristics we found may contribute to the further research of antioxidative mechanism.