Native electrospray ionization and electron-capture dissociation for comparison of protein structure in solution and the gas phase

作者：Zhang Hao; Cui Weidong; Gross Michael L^*

来源：International Journal of Mass Spectrometry, 2013, 354: 288-291.

DOI：10.1016/j.ijms.2013.06.019

• Protein structure
• Gas-phase vs. solution structure
• Native ESI
• Electron-capture dissociation (ECD)
• Top-down mass spectrometry

The importance of protein and protein-complex structure motivates improvements in speed and sensitivity of structure determination in the gas phase and comparison with that in solution or solid state. An opportunity for the gas-phase measurement is mass spectrometry (MS) combined with native electrospray ionization (ESI), which delivers large proteins and protein complexes in their near-native states to the gas phase. In this communication, we describe the combination of native ESI, electron-capture dissociation (ECD), and top-down MS for exploring the structures of ubiquitin and cytochrome c in the gas phase and their relation to those in the solid-state and solution. We probe structure by comparing the protein's flexible regions, as predicted by the B-factor in X-ray crystallography, with the ECD fragments. The underlying hypothesis is that maintenance of structure gives fragments that can be predicted from B-factors. This strategy may be applicable in general when X-ray structures are available and extendable to the study of intrinsically disordered proteins.

• 出版日期2013-11-15