Charge Manipulation Using Solution and Gas-Phase Chemistry to Facilitate Analysis of Highly Heterogeneous Protein Complexes in Native Mass Spectrometry.

ABSTRACT: Structural heterogeneity is a significant challenge complicating (and in some cases making impossible) electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (ESI MS) analysis of noncovalent complexes comprising structurally heterogeneous biopolymers. The broad mass distribution exhibited by such species inevitably gives rise to overlapping ionic signals representing different charge states, resulting in a continuum spectrum with no discernible features that can be used to assign ionic charges and calculate their masses. This problem can be circumvented by using limited charge reduction, which utilizes gas-phase chemistry to induce charge-transfer reactions within ionic populations selected within narrow m/z windows, thereby producing well-defined and readily interpretable charge ladders.

SUBMITTER: Yang Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8514162 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature