Combining peptide modeling and capillary electrophoresis-mass spectrometry for characterization of enzymes cleavage patterns: recombinant versus natural bovine pepsin A

Peptide mapping of proteins by capillary electromigration methods

This review article provides a wide overview of important developments and applications of capillary electromigration methods in the area of peptide mapping of proteins in the period 1997-mid-2022, including review articles on this topic. It deals with all major aspects of peptide mapping by capillary electromigration methods: i) precleavage sample preparation involving purification, preconcentration, denaturation, reduction and alkylation of protein(s) to be analyzed, ii) generation of peptide fragments by off-line or on-line enzymatic and/or chemical cleavage of protein(s), iii) postcleavage preparation of the generated peptide mixture for capillary electromigration separation, iv) separation of the complex peptide mixtures by one-, two- and multidimensional capillary electromigration methods coupled with mass spectrometry detection, and v) a large application of peptide mapping for variable purposes, such as qualitative analysis of monoclonal antibodies and other protein biopharmaceuticals, monitoring of posttranslational modifications, determination of primary structure and investigation of function of proteins in biochemical and clinical research, characterization of proteins of variable origin as well as for protein and peptide identification in proteomic and peptidomic studies.

Peptidomics and Capillary Electrophoresis

Peptides play a crucial role in many vitally important functions of living organisms. The goal of peptidomics is the identification of the "peptidome," the whole peptide content of a cell, organ, tissue, body fluid, or organism. In peptidomic or proteomic studies, capillary electrophoresis (CE) is an alternative technique for liquid chromatography. It is a highly efficient and fast separation method requiring extremely low amounts of sample. In peptidomic approaches, CE is commonly combined with mass spectrometric (MS) detection. Most often, CE is coupled with electrospray ionization MS and less frequently with matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization MS. CE-MS has been employed in numerous studies dealing with determination of peptide biomarkers in different body fluids for various diseases, or in food peptidomic research for the analysis and identification of peptides with special biological activities. In addition to the above topics, sample preparation techniques commonly applied in peptidomics before CE separation and possibilities for peptide identification and quantification by CE-MS or CE-MS/MS methods are discussed in this chapter.

Investigating the position of the separation capillary and emitter tube tips in a nanoflow sheath-liquid CE-ESI-MS interface to decouple the ESI potential

Robust decoupling of the ESI potential from the separation potential in CE-ESI-MS interfaces is very important for the high performance of the CE-ESI-MS devices and their applications for highly sensitive analyses of ionogenic compounds. In this study, we utilize a nanoflow sheath-liquid CE-ESI-MS interface composed of a quartz emitter and a separation fused silica capillary treated by etching, which are threaded to cross coupling for sheath liquid and electrode connection. Specifically, we have tested the ability of the interface to decouple the ESI potential from the separation potential at different positions of the separation capillary and ESI emitter tube tips. The interface with the separation capillary tip protruding the emitter tip by 20 μm did not provide sufficient robustness. The real ESI potential (delivered as 2.0 kV from the independent high voltage power supply HV2) ranged from 2.1 kV to 4.5 kV depending on the applied separation voltage (12.0-20.0 kV, provided by the power supply HV1) and electric conductivity of the background electrolyte (BGE) used. The interface robustness was partially improved when the capillary tip was aligned with the emitter tip. However, the complete decoupling of the spray and separation potentials was achieved only when the capillary tip was retracted 20 μm inside the emitter. In this arrangement, the ESI potential was stable and independent of both the separation potential (voltage) and the BGE conductivity. Moreover, this setting provided better sensitivity for the CE-ESI-MS analysis of selected drugs and benzylpyridinium cations than the setup with the capillary tip aligned with or protruding the emitter tip.

Capillary electrophoretic profiling of in-bone tryptic digests of proteins as a potential tool for the detection of inflammatory states in oral surgery

The commonly used histological assessment of pathological states of alveolar bone tissues in oral surgery needs laborious and time-consuming processing by an experienced histologist. Therefore, a simpler and faster methodology is required in this field. Following this demand, this paper reports a straightforward approach using the tryptic cleavage of proteins directly in bone without its demineralization, followed by the capillary electrophoresis-ultraviolet detection profiling of the yielded protein digest. Cleavage-derived peptides were separated by capillary electrophoresis in acidic background electrolytes, pH 2.01-2.54. The best resolution of peptide fragments with the highest peak capacity was achieved in the background electrolyte composed of 55 mM H₃ PO₄ , 14 mM tris(hydroxymethyl)aminomethan, pH 2.01. The differences in the obtained capillary electrophoresis-ultraviolet detection profiles with characteristic patterns for particular bone samples were subsequently discriminated by linear discriminant analysis over principal components. This approach was first verified on porcine bone tissues as model samples; jawbone and calf bone tissues could be discriminated with an accuracy of 100%. Subsequently, the method was capable of differentiating unequivocally between human healthy and inflammatory alveolar bone tissues obtained from oral surgery. This procedure seems to be promising as complement or even an alternative to the traditional histological discrimination between healthy and inflammatory bone tissues in oral surgery.

Predicting Electrophoretic Mobility of Tryptic Peptides for High-Throughput CZE-MS Analysis

A multiparametric sequence-specific model for predicting peptide electrophoretic mobility has been developed using large-scale bottom-up proteomic CE-MS data (5% (∼0.8M) acetic acid as background electrolyte). Peptide charge (Z) and size (molecular mass, M) are the two major factors determining electrophoretic mobility, in complete agreement with previous studies. The extended size of the data set (>4000 peptides) permits access to many sequence-specific factors that impact peptide mobility. The presence of acidic residues Asp and Glu near the peptide N-terminus is by far the most prominent among them. The induction effect of the side chain of N-terminal Asp reduces the basicity of the N-terminal amino group and, as hence, its charge, by ∼0.27 units, lowering mobility. The correlation of the model (R² ∼ 0.995) indicates that the peptide separation process in CZE is relatively simple and can be predicted to a much higher precision than current RP-HPLC models. Similar to RP-HPLC prediction studies, we anticipate future developments that introduce peptide migration standards, collect larger data sets for modeling through the alignment of multiple CZE-MS acquisitions, and study of the behavior of peptides carrying post-translational modifications. The increased size of data sets will also permit investigation of the fine-scale effects of peptide secondary structure on peptide mobility. We observed that peptides with higher helical propensity tend to have higher than predicted electrophoretic mobility; the incorporation of these features into CZE migration models will require significantly larger data sets.

Modelling the electrophoretic migration behaviour of peptides and glycopeptides from glycoprotein digests in capillary electrophoresis-mass spectrometry

In this study, the classical semiempirical relationships between the electrophoretic mobility and the charge-to-mass ratio (me vs. q/M(α)) were used to model the migration behaviour of peptides and glycopeptides originated from the digestion of recombinant human erythropoietin (rhEPO), a biologically and therapeutically relevant glycoprotein. The Stoke's law (α=1/3), the classical polymer model (α=1/2) and the Offord's surface law (α=2/3) were evaluated to predict migration of peptides and glycopeptides, with and without sialic acids (SiA), in rhEPO digested with trypsin and trypsin-neuraminidase. The Stoke's law resulted in better correlations for the set of peptides used to evaluate the models, while glycopeptides fitted better with the classical polymer model. Once predicted migration times with both models, it was easy to simulate their separation electropherogram. Results were later validated predicting migration and simulating separation of a different set of rhEPO glycopeptides and also human transferrin (Tf) peptides and glycopeptides. The excellent agreement between the experimental and the simulated electropherograms with rhEPO and Tf digests confirmed the potential applicability of this simple strategy to predict, in general, the peptide-glycopeptide electrophoretic map of any digested glycoprotein.

Identification of bioactive peptides in hypoallergenic infant milk formulas by CE-TOF-MS assisted by semiempirical model of electromigration behavior

Biologically active peptides derived from complex bovine milk protein hydrolysates are of particular interest in food science and nutrition because they have been shown to play different physiological roles, providing benefits in human health. In this study, we used CE-TOF-MS for separation and identification of bioactive peptides in three hypoallergenic infant milk formulas. An appropriate sample cleanup using a citrate buffer with DTT and urea followed by SPE with Sep-Pack® C18 and StrataX™ cartridges allowed the detection of a large number of low molecular mass bioactive peptides. This preliminary identification was solely based on the measured experimental monoisotopic molecular mass values (M(exp)). Later, we evaluated the classical semiempirical relationships between electrophoretic mobility and charge-to-mass ratio (m(e) vs. q/M(α), α = 1/2 for the classical polymer model) to describe their migration behavior. The assistance of migration prediction proved to be useful to improve reliability of the identification, avoiding misinterpretations and solving some identity conflicts. After revision, the identity of 24, 30, and 38 bioactive peptides was confirmed in each of the three infant milk formulas. A significant number of these peptides were reported as inhibitors of angiotensin-converting enzyme, however, the presence of sequences with other biological activities such as antihypertensive, antithrombotic, hypocholesterolemic, immunomodulation, cytotoxicity, antioxidant, antimicrobial, antigenic, or opioid was also confirmed.

Online electrospray ionization mass spectrometric monitoring of protease-catalyzed reactions in real time

Although there are a lot of well established methods for monitoring enzyme-catalyzed reactions, most of them are based on changes in spectroscopic properties during the conversion of substrates to products. However, reactions without optical changes are common, which are inapplicable to these spectroscopic methods. As an alternative technique for enzymologic research, mass spectrometry (MS) is favored due to its specificity, sensitivity, and the ability to obtain stoichiometric information. In this work, probe electrospray ionization (PESI) source coupled with a time of flight mass spectrometer was employed to monitor some typical protease-catalyzed reactions, including pepsinolysis and trypsinolysis of cytochrome c in real time. Due to the high electrical conductivity of each reaction system, corona discharges are likely to occur, which would decrease intensities of mass spectrometric signals. An ultra-fine sampling probe and an auxiliary vapor spray were adopted to prevent corona discharges. Experimental results from peptic and tryptic digestions of cytochrome c showed different and characteristic catalytic pathways. With the data presented in this study, PESI-MS can be considered as a potential tool for real-time monitoring of enzymatic reactions because of its simplicity in instrumental configuration, wide applicability under harsh conditions, and flexibility in combination with other techniques.

New ammunition for the proteomic reactor: strong anion exchange beads and multiple enzymes enhance protein identification and sequence coverage

The enrichment and processing of proteomic samples prior to multi-dimensional chromatography remain a challenge in 'gel-free' proteomics. We previously reported the development of a microfluidic device called the "proteomic reactor" that relied on enriching proteins by using strong cation exchange (SCX) followed by trypsin digestion in an interstitial volume as little as 50 nL. Here, we report a novel proteomic reactor that is based on polymeric strong anion exchange (SAX) material to analyse proteomic samples. We also compare the performance of the SAX proteomic reactor to our previously reported SCX proteomic reactor for analysing complex yeast proteomes. Our results indicate that the SAX protein reactor preferentially identifies more acidic peptides and proteins compared to the SCX reactor. We show that the SAX and SCX reactors are complementary and that their combination increases the number of unique peptides and proteins identified by 50%. Furthermore, we show that the number of protein identified can be increased further by up to 40% using different proteolytic enzymes on the proteomic reactor.

Capillary electrophoresis applied to proteomic analysis

In the postgenomic era, proteomics has become a dominant field for identifying and quantifying the complex protein machinery of the cell. The expression levels, posttranslational modifications, and specific interactions of proteins control the biology of such processes as development, differentiation, and signal transduction. Studies of the proteins involved in these processes often lead to a better understanding of biology and of human disease. Powerful separation techniques and sensitive detection methods enable researchers to untangle these complicated networks of processes. CE coupled with either MS or LIF are two of the techniques that make this possible. This review will cover proven CE-based methods for proteomics on the cell and tissue level and their application in biological and clinical studies, relevant new developments in enabling technology such as microfluidic CE-MS demonstrated on model systems, and comment on the future of CE in proteomics.

Hydration, charge, size, and shape characteristics of peptides from their CZE analyses

A CZE model is presented for peptide characterization on the basis of well-established physicochemical equations. The effective mobility is used as basic data in the model to estimate relevant peptide properties such as, for instance, hydration, net and total electrical charge numbers, hydrodynamic size and shape, particle average orientation, and pH-microenvironment from the charge regulation phenomenon. Therefore 102 experimental effective mobilities of different peptides are studied and discussed in relation to previous work. An equation for the estimation of peptide hydration as a function of ionizing, polar, and non-polar amino acid residues is included in the model. It is also shown that the shape-orientation factor of peptides may be either lower or higher than one, and its value depends on a complex interplay among total charge number, molar mass, hydration, and amino acid sequence.

Recent developments in CE and CEC of peptides

The article brings a comprehensive survey of recent developments and applications of high-performance capillary electromigration methods, zone electrophoresis, ITP, IEF, affinity electrophoresis, EKC, and electrochromatography, to analysis, preparation, and physicochemical characterization of peptides. New approaches to the theoretical description and experimental verification of electromigration behavior of peptides and to methodology of their separations, such as sample preparation, adsorption suppression, and detection, are presented. Novel developments in individual CE and CEC modes are shown and several types of their applications to peptide analysis are presented: conventional qualitative and quantitative analysis, purity control, determination in biomatrices, monitoring of chemical and enzymatical reactions and physical changes, amino acid and sequence analysis, and peptide mapping of proteins. Some examples of micropreparative peptide separations are given and capabilities of CE and CEC techniques to provide important physicochemical characteristics of peptides are demonstrated.

Reproducible and efficient separation of aggregatable zein proteins by CZE using a volatile background electrolyte

Zein proteins are a complex mixture of polypetides that belong to the alcohol-soluble storage proteins group (prolamines) in corn. These proteins constitute about 50-60% of the total endosperm protein and are classified in different groups on the basis of differences in their solubility and sequence. Among them, zein proteins are considered the majority group showing a high tendency to aggregate what makes their analysis by any analytical method very difficult. Thus, CZE of these proteins requires the use of very complex BGEs noncompatible with online ESI-MS analysis. The aim of this work was to find a new BGE for the CZE separation of zein protein fully compatible with ESI-MS while providing further light on the complex CZE separation of aggregatable proteins. Thus, it is demonstrated in this work that efficient and reproducible CZE separations of zein proteins can be achieved by using a BGE composed of water, ACN, formic acid and ammonium hydroxide. Besides, it is shown that zein analysis is significantly improved by including the effect of an ammonium gradient during their separation. It is experimentally verified that the ammonium gradient can easily be achieved in CZE by either working with a sample zone with a low concentration of ammonium and a BGE with a high concentration, or conversely, working with a sample zone with high ammonium concentration and a BGE with low concentration of ammonium, giving rise in both cases to a significant improvement in the CZE separation of these proteins. It is demonstrated that this procedure can give rise to efficiency improvements of up to 20-fold in the CZE separation of zein proteins. Under optimized conditions, 20 proteins could be separated with average efficiencies higher than 400 000 theoretical plates/m. Some possible explanations of this effect are discussed including stacking, protein-capillary wall adsorption, protein solubility and protein-salt interactions.

Mass distribution, polydispersity, and focusing properties of carrier ampholytes for IEF. Part V: pH 9-11 interval

As a last part of an investigation on all 2-pH-unit intervals of carrier ampholytes (CAs) for IEF (see Electrophoresis 2006, 27, 3919-3934; 2006, 27, 4849-4858; 2007, 28, 715-723) two different lots of Servalyt CAs, in the pH 9-11 range, have been analyzed by a 2-D technique based on preparative Rotofor fractionation followed by capillary electrophoresis mass-spectrometry of 10 out of 20 fractions harvested, in the second dimension. The findings: the two lots contain 65 and 69 different M(r) compounds, in the M(r) interval of 232-667 Da, for a total of 341-387 isoforms, respectively. Since this is a chaotic organic synthesis, the high reproducibility (here demonstrated for the first time during the 40 years of existence of CAs) of the synthetic process (for two batches produced at 6 years of distance) is remarkable, considering that a 94% agreement for the individual chemicals and 88% agreement for the total number of isoforms for the two lots is found. It is additionally demonstrated that the lower pI species are accompanied by considerably more isoforms than the high pI forms and that in all cases such isoforms consist of family of compounds clustered around the pI of the parental form, with a pI spread of ca. 0.1-0.2 pH units.

Simplified 2-D CE-MS mapping: Analysis of proteolytic digests

It has been demonstrated that CE-MS is a very useful hyphenated technique for proteomic studies. However, the huge amount of data stored in a single CE-MS run makes it necessary to account with procedures able to extract all the relevant information made available by CE-MS. In this work, we present a new and easy approach capable of generating a simplified 2-D map from CE-MS raw data. This new approach provides the automatic detection and characterization of the most abundant ions from the CE-MS data including their mass-to-charge (m/z) values, ion intensities and analysis times. It is demonstrated that visualization of CE-MS data in this simplified 2-D format allows: (i) an easy and simultaneous visual inspection of large datasets, (ii) an immediate perception of relevant differences in closely related samples, (iii) a rapid monitoring of data quality levels in different samples, and (iv) a fast discrimination between comigrating polypeptides and ESI-MS fragmentation ions. The strategy proposed in this work does not rely on an excellent mass accuracy for peak detection and filtering, since MS values obtained from an IT analyzer are used. Moreover, the methodology developed works directly with the CE-MS raw data, without interference by the user, giving simultaneously a simplified 2-D map and a much easier and more complete data evaluation. Besides, this procedure can easily be implemented in any CE-MS laboratory. The usefulness of this approach is validated by studying the very similar trypsin digests from bovine, rabbit and horse cytochrome c. It is demonstrated that this simplified 2-D approach allows specific markers for each species to be obtained in a fast and simple way.

Mass distribution, polydispersity and focusing properties of carrier ampholytes for IEF. IV: pH 6–8 intervals

Four commercial brands of carrier ampholytes (Ampholine, Pharmalyte, Servalyt, Bio-Lyte), in the pH 6-8 range, have been analyzed by a 2-D technique based on preparative Rotofor fractionation followed by CE-MS of 10 out of 20 fractions harvested, in the second dimension. The findings: Ampholine (pH 6-8) contains 80 different M(r) compounds, in the M(r) interval 216-979 Da, for a total of 326 isoforms. Bio-Lyte (pH 6-8) consists of 62 different M(r) species, in the M(r) range 341-1048 Da, for a total of 237 isoforms. Servalyt (pH 6-8) is made of 126 different M(r) compounds, in the M(r) interval 240-785 Da, for a total of 703 isoforms. Pharmalyte (pH 5-8) comprises 123 amphoteres, in the M(r) range of 221-992 Da, for a total of 476 isoforms. Pharmalyte appears to be the best brand, with a good proportion of species focusing sharply at their pI position and relatively few 'poor' species, distributed along the entire pH gradient. General conclusions are drawn on the properties of all the pH intervals explored in this series of investigations and some guidelines for possible synthetic routes ameliorating the neutral and alkaline pH intervals are discussed.

Metabolomics approach for enzyme discovery

The search for novel enzymes is an important but difficult task in functional genomics. Here, we present a systematic method based on in vitro assays in combination with metabolite profiling to discover novel enzymatic activities. A complex mixture of metabolites is incubated with purified candidate proteins and the reaction mixture is subsequently profiled by capillary electrophoresis electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (CE-MS). Specific changes in the metabolite composition can directly suggest the presence of an enzymatic activity while subsequent identification of the compounds whose level changed specifically can pinpoint the actual substrate(s) and product(s) of the reaction. We first evaluated the method using several Escherichia coli metabolic enzymes and then applied it to the functional screening of uncharacterized proteins. In this manner, YbhA and YbiV proteins were found to display both phosphotransferase and phosphatase activity toward different sugars/sugar phosphates. Our approach should be broadly applicable and useful for enzyme discovery in any system.

Sample treatments prior to capillary electrophoresis-mass spectrometry

Sample preparation is a crucial part of chemical analysis and in most cases can become the bottleneck of the whole analytical process. Its adequacy is a key factor in determining the success of the analysis and, therefore, careful selection and optimization of the parameters controlling sample treatment should be carried out. This work revises the different strategies that have been developed for sample preparation prior to capillary electrophoresis-mass spectrometry (CE-MS). Namely the present work presents an exhaustive and critical revision of the different samples treatments used together with on-line CE-MS including works published from January 2000 to July 2006.