Vector Laboratories
Proprietary discrete polyethylene glycol (dPEG®) pegylation reagents
Vector Laboratories’ mission is to empower scientific curiosity through a culture of service, reliable products, and unmatched technical expertise, allowing scientists and organizations to move science forward with impact.
Supporting scientific industries worldwide for over 45 years, Vector Laboratories is recognized as a pioneer and market leader in immunohistochemistry, immunofluorescence, glycobiology, and bioconjugation products. As the first company to commercialize avidin-biotin enzyme complex kits for immunohistochemistry and antifade mounting media for immunofluorescence, Vector Laboratories has since introduced over 600 reliable reagents and kits.
What Is A DPEG®?
The term “dPEG®” is Quanta BioDesigns trademarked acronym for “discrete poly(ethylene glycol)” or “discrete PEG”. Each of our products represents a single compound with a unique, specific, single molecular weight (MW) PEG synthesized de novo from pure, small units (e.g., triethylene glycol or tetraethylene glycol). In our numbering system, we name compounds as dPEG®nn, where nn stands for the number of oxygen atoms in the spacer unit. We do this in order to simplify the naming of the compounds. Our catalog has the exact structure of the single compound. Thus, for example, product number 10244, amino-dPEG®4-acid, has an amino group on one end, four (4) ethylene oxide units, and a carboxylic acid group on the other end, as shown below:
Some people prefer the term “monodisperse” to describe these PEG compounds. While not an inappropriate term, “monodisperse” implies either that
- the compounds are single compounds purified from a polymeric mixture, or
- there is only one compound formed from a polymeric process, which is purely a theoretical concept. We prefer the term “discrete”, since these compounds are synthesized as single MW compounds from pure starting materials via standard organic methodology. A discrete PEG is a single compound having no other PEG homologues in it.