Pandeswari PB, Chary RN, Kamalanathan AS, Prabhakar S, Sabareesh V. Mimicking LysC Proteolysis by 'Arginine-Modification-cum-Trypsin digestion': Comparison of Bottom-Up & Middle-Down Proteomic Approaches by ESI-QTOF-MS.
Protein Pept Lett 2021;
28:1379-1390. [PMID:
34587878 DOI:
10.2174/0929866528666210929163307]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/23/2021] [Revised: 07/04/2021] [Accepted: 08/09/2021] [Indexed: 11/22/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND
Middle-down (MD) proteomics is an emerging approach for reliable identification of post- translational modifications and isoforms, as this approach focuses on proteolytic peptides containing > 25 - 30 amino acid residues (a.a.r.), which are longer than typical tryptic peptides. Such longer peptides can be obtained by AspN, GluC, LysC proteases. Additionally, some special proteases were developed specifically to effect MD approach, e.g., OmpT, Sap9, etc. However, these proteases are expensive. Herein we report a cost-effective strategy, 'arginine modification-cum trypsin digestion', which can produce longer tryptic peptides resembling LysC peptides derived from proteins.
OBJECTIVE
To obtain proteolytic peptides that resemble LysC peptides, by using 'trypsin', which is an less expensive protease.
METHODS
This strategy is based on the simple principle that trypsin cannot act at the C-termini of those arginines in proteins, whose sidechain guanidine groups are modified by 1,2-cyclohexanedione or phenylglyoxal.
RESULTS
As a proof of concept, we demonstrate this strategy on four models: β-casein (bovine), β- lactoglobulin (bovine), ovalbumin (chick) and transferrin (human), by electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry (ESI-MS) involving hybrid quadrupole time-of-flight. From the ESI-MS of these models, we obtained several arginine modified tryptic peptides, whose lengths are in the range, 30 - 60 a.a.r. The collision-induced dissociation MS/MS characteristics of some of the arginine modified longer tryptic peptides are compared with the unmodified standard tryptic peptides.
CONCLUSION
The strategy followed in this proof-of-concept study, not only helps in obtaining longer tryptic peptides that mimic LysC proteolytic peptides, but also facilitates in enhancing the probability of missed cleavages by the trypsin. Hence, this method aids in evading the possibility of obtaining very short peptides that are < 5 - 10 a.a.r. Therefore, this is indeed an cost-effective alternative/substitute for LysC proteolysis and in turn, for those MD proteomic studies that utilize LysC. Additionally, this methodology can be fruitful for mass spectrometry based de novo protein and peptide sequencing.
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