Open AccessThermal Analysis of a Mixture of Ribosomal Proteins by vT-ESI-MS: Toward a Parallel Approach for Characterizing the Stabilitome
Author(s) -
Tarick J. ElBaba,
Shan A. Raab,
R. Buckley,
Christopher J. Brown,
Corinne A. Lutomski,
Lucas W. Henderson,
Daniel W. Woodall,
Jianzhao Shen,
Jonathan C. Trinidad,
Hengyao Niu,
Martin F. Jarrold,
David H. Russell,
Arthur Laganowsky,
David E. Clemmer
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
analytical chemistry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.117
H-Index - 332
eISSN - 1520-6882
pISSN - 0003-2700
DOI - 10.1021/acs.analchem.1c00772
Subject(s) - chemistry , ribosomal protein , ribosomal rna , chromatography , biochemistry , ribosome , rna , gene
The thermal stabilities of endogenous, intact proteins and protein assemblies in complex mixtures were characterized in parallel by means of variable-temperature electrospray ionization coupled to mass spectrometry (vT-ESI-MS). The method is demonstrated by directly measuring the melting transitions of seven proteins from a mixture of proteins derived from ribosomes. A proof-of-concept measurement of a fraction of an Escherichia coli lysate is provided to extend this approach to characterize the thermal stability of a proteome. As the solution temperature is increased, proteins and protein complexes undergo structural and organizational transitions; for each species, the folded ↔ unfolded and assembled ↔ disassembled populations are monitored based on changes in vT-ESI-MS charge state distributions and masses. The robustness of the approach illustrates a step toward the proteome-wide characterization of thermal stabilities and structural transitions-the stabilitome.