The role of interchain disulfide bond in a recombinant human interleukin-17A variant.

Interleukin-17A (IL-17A) is the prototype of IL-17 family and has been implicated in the pathogenesis of a variety of autoimmune diseases. Therefore its structural and functional properties are of great medical interest. During our research on a recombinant human IL-17A (rhIL-17A) variant, four isoforms were obtained when it was refolded. While isoforms 1 and 2 represented non-covalent dimers, isoforms 3 and 4 were determined to be covalent dimers. All four isoforms were structurally similar by Circular Dichroism and fluorescence spectroscopy studies, but differential scanning calorimetry demonstrated thermal stability in the order of isoform 1=isoform 2

A fully integrated multi-column system for abundant protein depletion from serum/plasma.

This work details the transformation of a conventional HPLC system to a low back pressure liquid chromatography set-up for automated serum/plasma depletion and fractionation. A Dionex U3000 HPLC was converted to low back pressure operation (125 psi max) by replacing all narrow-bore lines to larger inner-diameter tubing. The system was configured to use two immunoaffinity columns, first for depletion of the top 14 most abundant proteins (Seppro IgY14), then for the next 200-300 proteins (Seppro SuperMix). The autosampler was dual-purposed for both injection and fraction collection. Both the flow-through and SuperMix bound proteins were collected in an automated fashion. Three samples could be depleted consecutively before the system required user intervention, and up to nine samples could be depleted within a 24 h period. This study documents the validation of the instrument performance with a 90-patient sample set, demonstrating overall CVs for 86 of the 90 samples to be within the 95% confidence intervals. Additionally, there was excellent reproducibility within the same patient (biological replicates) across days.

Characterization of a high-affinity human antibody with a disulfide bridge in the third complementarity-determining region of the heavy chain.

Disulfide bridges are common in the antigen-binding site from sharks (new antigen receptor) and camels (single variable heavy-chain domain, VHH), in which they confer both structural diversity and domain stability. In human antibodies, cysteine residues in the third complementarity-determining region of the heavy chain (CDR-H3) are rare but naturally encoded in the IGHD germline genes. Here, by panning a phage display library designed based on human germline genes and synthetic CDR-H3 regions against a human cytokine, we identified an antibody (M3) containing two cysteine residues in the CDR-H3. It binds the cytokine with high affinity (0.4 nM), recognizes a unique epitope on the antigen, and has a distinct neutralization profile as compared with all other antibodies selected from the library. The two cysteine residues form a disulfide bridge as determined by mass spectrometric peptide mapping. Replacing the cysteines with alanines did not change the solubility and stability of the monoclonal antibody, but binding to the antigen was significantly impaired. Three-dimensional modeling and dynamic simulations were employed to explore how the disulfide bridge influences the conformation of CDR-H3 and binding to the antigen. On the basis of these results, we envision that designing human combinatorial antibody libraries to contain intra-CDR or inter-CDR disulfide bridges could lead to identification of human antibodies with unique binding profiles.

Application of MALDI TOF/TOF mass spectrometry and collision-induced dissociation for the identification of disulfide-bonded peptides.

This paper describes a method for the fast identification and composition of disulfide-bonded peptides. A unique fragmentation signature of inter-disulfide-bonded peptides is detected using matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI) time-of-flight (TOF)/TOF mass spectrometry and high-energy collision-induced dissociation (CID). This fragmentation pattern identifies peptides with an interconnected disulfide bond and provides information regarding the composition of the peptides involved in the pairing. The distinctive signature produced using CID is a triplet of ions resulting from the cleavage of the disulfide bond to produce dehydroalanine, cysteine or thiocysteine product ions. This method is not applicable to intra-peptide disulfide bonds, as the cleavage mechanism is not the same and a triplet pattern is not observed. This method has been successfully applied to identifying disulfide-bonded peptides in a number of control digestions, as well as study samples where disulfide bond networks were postulated and/or unknown.

Expression, refolding and purification of a human interleukin-17A variant.

A human interleukin-17A (IL-17A) variant was overexpressed in Escherichia coli BL21 (DE3) under the control of a T(7) promoter. The resulting insoluble inclusion bodies were isolated and solubilized by homogenization with 6 M guanidine HCl. The denatured recombinant human IL-17A variant was refolded in 20 mM Tris-HCl, pH 9.0, 500 mM arginine, 500 mM guanidine HCl, 15% glycerol, 1 mM cystamine, and 5 mM cysteine at 2-8°C for 40 h. The refolded IL-17A variant was subsequently purified using a combination of cation-exchange, reversed-phase and fluoroapatite chromatography. The final purified product was a monodisperse and crystallizable homodimer with a molecular weight of 30,348.3 Da. The protein was active in both receptor binding competition assay and IL-17A-dependent biological activity assay using human dermal fibroblasts.

A multiple reaction monitoring method for absolute quantification of the human liver alcohol dehydrogenase ADH1C1 isoenzyme.

Although significant progress has been made in protein quantification using mass spectrometry during recent years, absolute protein quantification in complex biological systems remains a challenging task in proteomics. The use of stable isotope-labeled standard peptide is the most commonly used strategy for absolute quantification, but it might not be suitable in all instances. Here we report an alternative strategy that employs a stable isotope-labeled intact protein as an internal standard to absolutely quantify the alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) expression level in a human liver sample. In combination with a new targeted proteomics approach employing the method of multiple reaction monitoring (MRM), we precisely and quantitatively measured the absolute protein expression level of an ADH isoenzyme, ADH1C1, in human liver. Isotope-labeled protein standards are predicted to be particularly useful for measurement of highly homologous isoenzymes such as ADHs where multiple signature peptides can be examined by MRM in a single experiment.

A comparative proteomic study to characterize the vinblastine resistance in human ovarian cancer cells.

Drug resistance is a major impediment to the successful treatment of human cancers, including ovarian cancer. Vinblastine (VLB), an antimicrotubule agent, is one of the chemotherapeutic drugs that exhibit resistance in ovarian cancer patients. To determine the protein factors that are involved in vinblastine resistance in human ovarian cancer cells, a combination of sample pre-fractionation and high-resolution 2-DE proteomic analysis was performed. Approximately 1200 proteins were detected and quantitatively compared in both nuclear/membrane and cytosolic fractions. Sixty-nine proteins from the nuclear/membrane fraction showed altered expression levels, whereas 59 were altered in the cytosolic fraction between SKOV3 (vinblastine-sensitive) and SKVLB (vinblastine-resistant) cell lines. These proteins include membrane-associated, chromatin remodeling, cytoskeletal, and microtubule-associated proteins as well as others that regulate signal transduction. This study not only demonstrates a novel understanding of the mechanism of drug resistance but also provides a valuable resource for future studies on drug resistance to vinblastine. In addition, it also represents a good example of how to increase the protein dynamic range and reduce sample complexity using currently available tools.

Probing protein tertiary structure with amidination.

A chemical derivatization method, amidination, that has recently been effectively employed in peptide mass spectrometry experiments is used to covalently modify lysines in several standard proteins. Protein and peptide mass spectra identify sites at which the reaction does or does not occur. This is therefore a rapid approach to elucidate solvent-accessible regions of folded proteins.

Denaturation of metalloproteins with EDTA to facilitate enzymatic digestion and mass fingerprinting.

Metal ions bound to a protein often stabilize tertiary and/or quaternary structure. Consequently, the digestion of metalloproteins that precedes analysis by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry is frequently incomplete. It is demonstrated that ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) successfully destabilizes metalloprotein structure and thereby facilitates tryptic digestion and protein identification.

Photoimmobilization of proteins for affinity capture combined with MALDI TOF MS analysis.

Affinity capture surfaces can be prepared in a number of ways. A method of obtaining such surfaces through UV-activated immobilization of binding proteins using a benzophenone derivative is reported. Photoimmobilized protein G was used to selectively capture and preconcentrate bovine IgG from a mixture with BSA, and the affinity of photoattached concanavalin A toward ovalbumin was compared with that of commercially available concanavalin A on agarose beads. The results of the capture after tryptic digestion were analyzed by MALDI TOF MS. Immobilized trypsin was also prepared through photoimmobilization and later used to digest hemoglobin. Immobilized enzyme digestion resulted in more partial cleavages than solution-phase digestion. More methionine and tryptophan oxidation was also observed. Photoimmobilization was shown to be a quick and easy way of immobilizing ligands on surfaces.

Use of matrix clusters and trypsin autolysis fragments as mass calibrants in matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry.

Trypsin autolysis fragments and matrix clusters are often observed as intense peaks in mass spectra of protein digests. It is demonstrated that these can be exploited to improve the mass calibration of a matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight (MALDI-TOF) spectrometer. Interpretation of some of the autolysis masses is complicated by the existence of disulfide bonds. Surprisingly large matrix clusters are often visible for alpha-cyano-4-hydroxy-cinnamic acid. The fractional part of their masses differentiates them from protein digestion fragments.