freeze-thaw cycle comes up often in conversation and rarely with the context attached. Here we lay out the basics in order, then work through the practical considerations.
Last reviewed on 2025-12-10. Where a claim depends on a specific study, the study is described rather than over-claimed.
The primary structure of Selank is Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg-Pro-Gly-Pro, corresponding to the molecular formula C33H57N11O9 and a monoisotopic mass of roughly 751.9 daltons. The N-terminal threonine and the arginine residue in the fourth position are shared with tuftsin, which carries the sequence Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg. The three additional residues at the C-terminus, Pro-Gly-Pro, extend the chain and are associated with greater resistance to enzymatic degradation. This extension also separates Selank from the shorter parent peptide.
Naming conventions place Selank in the same research family as Semax, another Russian-developed peptide investigated for cognitive effects. The two compounds share a lineage but differ in sequence and in the biological systems proposed as their targets. Semax descends from ACTH fragments, whereas Selank descends from tuftsin. Publications sometimes identify Selank by its full peptide sequence or by laboratory codes rather than one uniform trade name. Because replication outside Russia is limited, reports on its properties are best read alongside the study design and the purity of the material tested.
Selank is a synthetic heptapeptide developed in Russia during the 1990s. Researchers at the Institute of Molecular Genetics of the Russian Academy of Sciences designed it as a stabilized analog of tuftsin, a naturally occurring immunomodulatory tetrapeptide. The compound has been studied primarily for its reported anxiolytic and nootropic effects. It remains largely unknown in Western pharmacology and is not approved as a medicine by major regulators such as the FDA or the EMA.
Outside its country of origin the compound is generally handled as a research chemical rather than an approved medicine. No regulatory approval from the United States Food and Drug Administration or the European Medicines Agency has been granted for human use. Identity and purity are normally checked by reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography, with mass spectrometry used to confirm the molecular mass. Lyophilised material is stored cold and desiccated, and repeated freeze-thaw cycles are avoided.
Published work on this peptide almost always uses intranasal delivery, with drops or a spray applied to the nasal mucosa. Some animal experiments have used subcutaneous or intraperitoneal injection, and a smaller number have compared routes directly. Oral administration is not a focus of the literature, because short peptides of this size are broken down by digestive enzymes and cross intestinal barriers poorly. How much of an intranasal dose reaches the bloodstream intact in humans remains an open question.
| Property | Value | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Molecular class | Synthetic heptapeptide | Stabilized analog of tuftsin |
| Sequence | Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg-Pro-Gly-Pro | Single-letter form: TKPRPGP |
| Molecular formula | C33H57N11O9 | Monoisotopic mass about 751.9 Da |
| Appearance | White to off-white powder | Typically supplied as lyophilized solid |
| Solubility | Freely soluble in water | Also soluble in common polar solvents |
Once dissolved, the peptide is markedly less stable than the dry powder. Aqueous solutions are subject to backbone hydrolysis and to microbial growth when they are handled without sterile technique. Buffered solutions near neutral pH are common for short-term laboratory work, while acidic conditions are sometimes used to improve solubility. Analytical laboratories generally prepare working solutions fresh rather than storing them, and a residual water film left in a reopened vial can seed degradation even when the container appears dry.
Reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography is the standard technique for estimating peptide purity. The result is a peak-area percentage, which describes how much of the detected material elutes as the main peak in one run. Mass spectrometry confirms the molecular mass and can reveal truncated, adducted, or otherwise modified species. Amino acid analysis or tandem mass spectrometry can address sequence fidelity when identity is in doubt. None of these measurements, taken alone, establishes that a sample is fit for any specific purpose.
Selank is a synthetic heptapeptide with the sequence Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg-Pro-Gly-Pro, frequently abbreviated as TKPRPGP. It was designed as a structural analogue of tuftsin, a naturally occurring tetrapeptide released by enzymatic cleavage of the immunoglobulin heavy chain. The two additional proline residues at the C-terminal end extend the parent chain and change how the molecule behaves in solution. The free peptide has a calculated molecular mass of approximately 751.9 g/mol and is generally supplied as a lyophilised white to off-white powder.
Development work on the compound began in the 1980s and 1990s at the Institute of Molecular Genetics in Moscow, within the same research programme that produced the peptide Semax. Early investigators sought a tuftsin derivative with improved resistance to enzymatic breakdown and with activity in the central nervous system after peripheral administration. Most of the primary literature from this period was published in Russian, a factor that still shapes how easily the findings can be checked by outside groups.
Most published work on selank originates from a small number of research groups in the Russian Federation. A large share of that record appears in Russian-language journals, which limits access for readers who rely on English-indexed databases. Independent replication by laboratories outside the original research network is sparse in publicly available sources. This concentration of origin and language is a frequently noted feature when the compound is summarized in broader reviews of synthetic peptides.
Reported pharmacological effects center on reduced anxiety-like behavior in animal models and on measures of memory and learning. Proposed contributing mechanisms include modulation of GABAergic signaling, shifts in monoamine turnover, and changes in the activity of enzymes that degrade neuropeptides. Effects on the expression of genes linked to neuroplasticity have also been described. No single molecular target is widely accepted, and whether the behavioral findings arise from one pathway or several remains an open question.
Selank is a synthetic heptapeptide with the sequence Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg-Pro-Gly-Pro. It was designed as a stabilized analogue of tuftsin, a naturally occurring tetrapeptide fragment derived from the immunoglobulin heavy chain. The additional Pro-Gly-Pro segment at the carboxyl terminus is intended to slow enzymatic cleavage. The compound is usually described in the literature as a synthetic peptide with anxiolytic and cognitive-related activity, a label that reflects a research context rather than an approved therapeutic category.
Handling follows standard practice for research peptides. Material is weighed in a low-humidity environment because the powder absorbs atmospheric moisture. Purity is reported as the percentage area of the main peak in a chromatogram, with specifications commonly set at 95 percent or higher; values below that threshold indicate the presence of truncated or modified species. Residual trifluoroacetate from purification is often present and may affect mass balance. Certificates of analysis should state the analytical method, the column and gradient used, and the lot-specific retention time so that results can be compared across suppliers.
Identity and purity of selank are established with reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry. The peptide elutes from C18 columns with acetonitrile gradients in water containing trifluoroacetic acid or formic acid, and detection is usually performed by ultraviolet absorbance near 214 nm. Electrospray ionization in positive mode gives a doubly protonated ion near m/z 377, consistent with a mass of about 752 Da. Amino acid analysis or tandem mass spectrometry of fragment ions confirms the sequence. Because the molecule has no aromatic residues, it lacks a usable 280 nm chromophore, so low-wavelength detection or mass spectrometry is required.
Peptide bonds in selank are susceptible to hydrolysis under strongly acidic or basic conditions, and the terminal proline residues are vulnerable to exopeptidase activity in biological samples. Lyophilized powder stored dry at -20 °C typically remains stable for extended periods, whereas aqueous solutions degrade faster and may lose measurable purity within days to weeks depending on pH, temperature, and microbial load. Repeated freeze-thaw cycles promote aggregation and adsorption to container surfaces. For analytical work, solutions are usually prepared fresh, kept cold, and used within a single working day.
Benzoic acid derivatives The benzoyl derivative cellotropin has been used for tuberculosis. Populin, which occurs in the leaves and bark of Populus tremula, is benzoyl salicin. Benzoyl-beta-D-glucoside is a compound found in the fern Pteris ensiformis.
Narrated by Paul Brightwell, produced by David Sington, directed by David McNab, made by Dox Productions 4 March The Engines That Came in from the Cold, about the Russian N1 rocket with an unexpected and surprising outcome to the documentary, and a reference to the 1963 book The Spy Who Came in from the Cold; George Mueller, head of Apollo programme from 1963 to 1969; Charles Vick of the Federation of American Scientists; Sergei Korolev, chief designer at OKB-1; Vasily Mishin, deputy chief designer at OKB-1, had done calculations showing that to get a cosmonaut on the Moon, it required a 100 tonne vehicle in orbit, which would require a 2,000 tonne vehicle at lift-off; Valentin Anisimov, chief designer at Kuznetsov Design Bureau, and how Korolev approached the Kuznetsov company, to make the new rocket engines for the proposed N1 rocket launcher, but it was too new and large to develop from scratch, so thirty pre-existing engines would be deployed, and the pre-burner which powered the rocket pumps would become a closed cycle, to improve power by 25%, but this was vastly untested; the first twelve launches would be uncrewed, followed by two test crewed launches, and the Soviet limited budget meant that development was not at a sufficient stage (that NASA would have arrived at) before the launches were carried out; this first uncrewed launch took place on 21 February 1969, and one minute into the flight, the rocket exploded; the N1 had a thrust of 4,500 tonnes at launch; the N1 second launch took place on 3 July 1969, after the engine control system was modified, and a few seconds after launch the engine cut out, and the whole N1 launcher fell onto the launch pad, causing total catastrophic results - this explosion stopped any further Soviet Union attempt to reach the Moon with a crewed rocket, the launch pad damage was unrecoverable; two weeks later Apollo 11 landed on the Moon; the N1 next launch was on 26 June 1971, with a rebuilt launch pad, and this launch exploded one minute into the flight; the fourth launch of the N1 on 23 November 1972 exploded two minutes into the flight; by the mid-1970s the Kuznetsov NK-33 closed-cycle engine, for the N1, had been sufficiently tested in its development lifetime; the Soviet Moon mission was around four years behind NASA, and when the engines were finally sufficiently tested, the whole Soviet Moon programme was stopped in 1974; any N1 engines and systems were instructed to be removed, to eliminate its knowledge; only in the early 1990s did knowledge of the N1 first appear; Bob Ford of Lockheed Martin and Bill Hoffman of Aerojet; Kuznetsov had nonetheless kept around sixty NK-33 engines in Samara - the home of Soviet rocketry, and wanted to show these engines to visitors from Aerojet; after a successful test of an NK-33 at Sacramento in October 1995, the NK-33 was developed into the RD-180, which powered the American Lockheed Martin Atlas III rocket; John Karas, of Lockheed Martin, at the first launch of an American rocket, on 24 May 2000 of the Eutelsat 36A satellite, that was powered by a Russian engine - the RD-180, which was twice as powerful as the NK-33, and one engine could replace five engines of the previous Atlas II; Vladimir Chvanov and Boris Katorgin, designers at NPO Energomash; the American rocket engineers had viewed the closed-cycle method as far too dangerous, and it was dangerous, but Russian engineers had developed new stainless steel alloys to largely overcome this danger. Narrated by Jaye Griffiths, produced by Hamish Barbour, directed by, made by Ideal World Productions 17 June The Day the Oceans Boiled, about the Earth's environment; 55 million years ago, the Earth was 6C hotter than it is now, with no ice caps, and trees grew at Antarctica, the temperature became 8C hotter, known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum; mammals shrunk in how large; since 55m years ago, carbon dioxide has been absorbed by plants, cooling the Earth; climate models were derived from weather forecast models; Peter Cox (climatologist) of the Met Office, and carbon sinks, and how each year 6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide enters the atmosphere, but the effect appears to be only from around 3 billion tonnes; Antonio Nobre of the National Institute of Amazonian Research - he found that the Amazon forest, and its 500 million hectares of trees, was a much bigger carbon sink than presumed - it could be absorbing three-quarters of the carbon dioxide of all the world's vehicles; the Greenland Ice Sheet Project, and Geoffrey Hargreaves at the National Science Foundation Ice Core Facility (NICL) in Colorado, and ice cores from the Vostok Station; the Earth has warmed and cooled in a 100,000 years cycle; the Met Office model predicted that after 2050, due to shortage of rainfall seasons, the Amazon forest would not act as a carbon sink; Carlos Nobre (scientist) and dry seasons, and the possible danger of fire, caused by changes in the tropical climate; Richard Corfield (scientist); Philip D. Gingerich of the University of Michigan; Santo Bains was researching the Paleocene-Eocene boundary, so went to the Gulf Coast Repository, and looked at Core 690 drilled by JOIDES Resolution of the Ocean Drilling Program from the Weddell Sea, and concluded that rapid changes in Earth temperature came from methane clathrates (methane hydrates); geologist Euan Nisbet; the Earth returned to lower temperatures after 60,000 years. Narrated by Matthew Zajac, directed by David Sington, made by Dox Productions 24 June The Fish That Time Forgot, about the coelacanth; Margery Courtney Latimer in 1938 of the Natural History Museum, London, and a fish caught at East London; J. L. B. Smith, from Grahamstown, of Rhodes University; the American Museum of Natural History; evolutionary biologist John McCusker; the Comoro Islands, run by the French, near Madagascar, where another fish was found in 1952; Mike Ruton; Robin Stobbs; the JAGO (German research submersible) and Hans Fricke of the Max Planck Institute for Behavioral Physiology, who found a live fish on 17 January 1987; Susan Jewett of the National Museum of Natural History in Washington; on 30 July 1998, a live female fish is found on a beach in Indonesia by Mark Erdmann. Narrated by Robert Lindsay, produced by Ron Ackerman, directed by Celia Lowenstein, made by Diverse Productions with Nova 8 July The Secret Life of the Mouse, about the laboratory mouse; zoologist Sam Berry of UCL; mouse geneticist Jo Peters of MRC Harwell; Irving Weissman; most genetic research is done with mice, with 25 million a year; Steve Brown, Director of MRC Harwell; the mouse has 99.9% of the genes of humans; the Jackson Laboratory has 1m mice and around 1,000 human staff, with 2,500 strains of mice, who have mouse models of human diseases, and mice breed much quicker than humans do; Beverly Paigen; in one year, there are three generations of mice; twenty Nobel prizes have depended on mouse research; Cliffe Rosen of the Maine Center of Osteoporosis Research; scientists want mutant mice for each gene; Charles Vacanti of the University of Massachusetts Medical School, whose cartilage research led to a mouse having an artificial cartilage human ear grown on its back; Philip Leder of Harvard Medical School, who placed a patent on a mouse; a fluorescent mouse; Hank Greely of Stanford University; it ends with the opening lines from A Tale of Two Cities. Narrated by Stephen Fry, produced by David Paterson, directed by Kevin Hull, made by BOA 2001. The documentary has overtones of the music video of the 2001 Where's Your Head At, made in the same year as the documentary 15 July Saving the Leaning Tower, a documentary chronicling the dramatic rescue of one of the world’s most iconic landmarks. By the late 1980s, the Leaning Tower of Pisa was on the brink of collapse, its southward tilt increasing steadily and threatening catastrophic failure. Alarm spread after the sudden fall of a medieval bell tower in Pavia in 1989, which convinced authorities to close Pisa’s monument to the public. An international committee of engineers, geologists, and historians was formed to save the tower, among them British civil engineer John Burland. Through detailed investigation, the team uncovered the structural weaknesses behind the marble façade and the unstable soils beneath Pisa. Computer models showed the tower should already have collapsed. Temporary steel tendons and 600 tonnes of lead counterweights prevented immediate disaster, but the tower’s fate remained uncertain. Burland proposed a novel, delicate solution: controlled “soil extraction” below the northern side to allow the tower to gently tilt back to stability. The project was plagued by risks, political disputes, and near-disasters, including the “Black September” of 1995, when freezing the foundations caused the tower to lurch alarmingly. Despite opposition, the soil extraction method was eventually approved in 1998. Over two years, engineers removed around 70 tonnes of soil, gradually reducing the lean by half a meter without visible alteration to the monument. By June 2001, the tower had been successfully stabilized, restored to the inclination it had in the 18th century, and reopened to the public. The operation was hailed as one of the greatest feats of modern civil engineering, ensuring the survival of Pisa’s unique heritage for centuries to come. The documentary presents not only the technical challenges but also the cultural, historical, and emotional significance of preserving this medieval masterpiece. 13 October Battle of the Robots: The Hunt for AI, about the work of Hugo de Garis, Rodney Brooks, and Steve Grand (roboticist); the documentary opens with the archetypal and iconic robot HAL 9000 from the 1968 2001: A Space Odyssey (film) and The Blue Danube; Igor Aleksander, who worked in neural systems at Imperial College London, and his views on the likelihood of computational intelligence; Dan Dennett; British roboticist Steve Grand, of North Somerset made the world's first AI computer game Creatures in 1996, and was designing a glider that could teach itself; Blay Whitby of the University of Sussex; the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and Brian Scassellati, who was designing a social robot called Cog (project); Belgian Walter De Brouwer of Starlab in Belgium; engineer Kevin Warwick of the University of Reading at the 2001 Royal Society Prizes for Science Books (Aventis Prize for Science Books), won by Robert Kunzig. Narrated by Patrick Forbes, produced by Nicolas Kent 28 October Bioterror, an Equinox Special, about biological weapons, with Judith Miller and her 2001 book Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War; Robert Kadlec of the National War College; science writer William Broad; the ATCC in Manassas, Virginia; microbiologist William C. Patrick III; the 2001 anthrax attacks; microbiologist Richard O. Spertzel; geneticist Matthew Meselson; Gennady Lepyoshkin, Director from 1987 to 2001 of a Russian secret biological research site; Jonathan B. Tucker; Chris Shays; Andrew C. Weber; Sergei Popov (bioweaponeer) had worked at the State Research Center for Applied Microbiology in Obolensk, Moscow Oblast. Produced by Matthew Collins, directed by Kirk Wolfinger, made by WGBH. Shown on Tuesday 20 November 2001 on The Nature of Things in Canada, and on Nova, and on Nova on Tuesday 13 November 2001
== Specialties == Proline is one of the two amino acids that do not follow along with the typical Ramachandran plot, along with glycine. Due to the ring formation connected to the beta carbon, the ψ and φ angles about the peptide bond have fewer allowable degrees of rotation. As a result, it is often found in "turns" of proteins as its free entropy (ΔS) is not as comparatively large to other amino acids and thus in a folded form vs. unfolded form, the change in entropy is smaller. Furthermore, proline is rarely found in α and β structures as it would reduce the stability of such structures, because its side chain α-nitrogen can only form one nitrogen bond. Additionally, proline is the only amino acid that does not form a red-purple colour when developed by spraying with ninhydrin for uses in chromatography. Proline, instead, produces an orange-yellow colour.
The first attempt to give scientific basis for the cause of this disease was by a ship's surgeon in the Royal Navy, James Lind. While at sea in May 1747, Lind provided some crew members with two oranges and one lemon per day, in addition to normal rations, while others continued on cider, vinegar, sulfuric acid or seawater, along with their normal rations, in one of the world's first controlled experiments. The results showed that citrus fruits prevented the disease. Lind published his work in 1753 in his Treatise on the Scurvy. Fresh fruit was expensive to keep on board, whereas boiling it down to juice allowed easy storage, but destroyed the vitamin (especially if it was boiled in copper kettles). It was 1796 before the British navy adopted lemon juice as standard issue at sea. In 1845, ships in the West Indies were provided with lime juice instead, and in 1860 lime juice was used throughout the Royal Navy, giving rise to the American use of the nickname "limey" for the British. Captain James Cook had previously demonstrated the advantages of carrying "Sour krout" on board by taking his crew on a 1772–75 Pacific Ocean voyage without losing any of his men to scurvy. For his report on his methods the British Royal Society awarded him the Copley Medal in 1776. The name antiscorbutic was used in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for foods known to prevent scurvy. These foods included lemons, limes, oranges, sauerkraut, cabbage, malt, and portable soup.
Aspirin Ibuprofen (Advil, Nurofen) Naproxen (Aleve) There are several potential pharmacokinetic interactions between the various individual SSRIs and other medications. Most of these arise from the fact that every SSRI can inhibit certain P450 cytochrome enzymes.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
The lowest temperatures on record in most cities in the eastern United States were set after a mass of cold air came south from Canada. Record lows ranged from International Falls, Minnesota −45 °F (−43 °C) to Washington, D.C. and Jackson, Mississippi−5 °F (−21 °C), and were set in Milwaukee −26 °F (−32 °C), Pittsburgh −18 °F (−28 °C) and Cleveland −17 °F (−27 °C) Winston Cenac resigned as Prime Minister of Saint Lucia after 8 months in office, and was succeeded temporarily by Finance Minister Michael Pilgrim. Born: Dwyane Wade, American NBA player and team owner, 2006 MVP of the NBA Finals for the Miami Heat, inductee to the Basketball Hall of Fame, and later a minority owner of the Utah Jazz and the WNBA Chicago Sky; in Chicago Died: Varlam Shalamov, Russian writer known for Kalyma's Notes, an exposure of the horrors of Soviet labor camps, where he had been incarcerated from 1937 to 1954 Jusuf Gërvalla, 38, Albanian-born Yugoslavian Kosovo independence activist and founder of a Yugoslavian separatist group, the National Movement for the Liberation of Kosovo, was shot to death in West Germany by Yugoslavia's State Security Service. He, his brother Bardhosh Gërvalla, and another activist, Kadri Zeka, were sitting in a car in the town of Untergruppenbach when all three were killed. William Price, 86, British World War One flying ace with seven shootdowns Pierre De Cazenove De Pradines, 87, French flying ace in World War One with seven aerial victories.
The SAF is being developed to respond to a wide range of issues in both conventional and unconventional warfare. The Defence Science and Technology Agency (DSTA) is responsible for procuring resources for the military. The geographic restrictions of Singapore mean that the SAF must plan to fully repulse an attack, as they cannot fall back and re-group. The small size of the population has also affected the way the SAF has been designed, with a small active force and a large number of reserves.
Amifostine is an organic thiophosphate prodrug which is hydrolysed in vivo by alkaline phosphatase to the active cytoprotective thiol metabolite, WR-1065. The selective protection of non-malignant tissues is believed to be due to higher alkaline phosphatase activity, higher pH, and vascular permeation of normal tissues. Amifostine can be administered intravenously or subcutaneously after reconstitution with normal saline. Infusions lasting less than 15 minutes decrease the risk of adverse effects. The patient should be well-hydrated prior to administration.
Cameron introduced the referendum in order to fulfill a manifesto pledge, but campaigned on the side of the "remain" vote, along with most of the other major parties. Some members of the Conservatives, as well as the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and UK Independence Party (UKIP), campaigned to "leave." The "leave" vote unexpectedly won, and a few hours later Cameron announced he would resign. A leadership election was held and Cameron was succeeded by Theresa May. May became the UK's second female prime minister after Margaret Thatcher, as well as the first woman to hold two of the Great Offices of State. She began the process of withdrawing the UK from the European Union, triggering Article 50 in March 2017. The following month, she announced a snap general election, with the aims of strengthening her hand in Brexit negotiations and campaigning on "strong and stable" leadership. This election resulted in a hung parliament, in which the Conservatives actually losing seats, despite the party winning its highest vote share since 1983. The loss of an overall majority prompted her to enter a confidence and supply arrangement with the DUP of Northern Ireland to support a minority government. After versions of her draft withdrawal agreement were rejected by Parliament three times, she resigned in 2019 and was succeeded by Boris Johnson, her former Foreign Secretary. Following further defeats in Parliament, Johnson prorogued parliament, an act deemed illegal by the Supreme Court.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
Selank is a synthetic heptapeptide designed as a stabilized analog of the natural tetrapeptide tuftsin. It has been investigated mainly for anxiolytic and cognitive effects. It is not an approved pharmaceutical in most countries.
It was developed in Russia, at the Institute of Molecular Genetics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, during the 1990s. Most published research originates from Russian institutions. Independent international replication remains limited.
Tuftsin is a natural tetrapeptide with the sequence Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg that participates in immune signaling. Selank extends that sequence with Pro-Gly-Pro at the C-terminus. The added residues are linked to greater resistance to enzymatic breakdown.
Most published work uses intranasal application, either as drops or as a nasal spray. Injection routes appear in a smaller set of animal experiments. Oral use is uncommon in the literature because peptide breakdown and poor absorption limit this route.