Abstract
Collision-activated dissociation (CAD) of tryptic peptides is a cornerstone of mass spectrometry-based proteomics research. Principal component analysis of a database containing 15,000 high-resolution CAD mass spectra of gas-phase tryptic peptide dications revealed that they fall into two classes with a good separation between the classes. The main factor determining the class identity is the relative abundance of the peptide bond cleavage after the first two N-terminal residues. A possible scenario explaining this bifurcation involves trans- to cis-isomerization of the N-terminal peptide bond, which facilitates solvation of the N-terminal charge on the second backbone amide and formation of stable b 2 ions in the form of protonated diketopiperazines. Evidence supporting this scenario is derived from statistical analysis of the high-resolution CAD MS/MS database. It includes the observation of the strong deficit of a 3 ions and anomalous amino acid preferences for b 2 ion formation.
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Published online August 9, 2008
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Savitski, M.M., Fälth, M., Eva Fung, Y.M. et al. Bifurcating fragmentation behavior of gas-phase tryptic peptide dications in collisional activation. J Am Soc Mass Spectrom 19, 1755–1763 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasms.2008.08.003
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasms.2008.08.003