millisecond-hydrogendeuterium-exchange-mass-spectrometry-for-study

Millisecond Hydrogen/Deuterium-Exchange Mass Spectrometry for the Study of Alpha-Synuclein Structural Dynamics Under Physiological Conditions

Alpha-synuclein (aSyn) is an intrinsically disordered protein whose fibrillar aggregates are abundant in Lewy bodies and neurites, which are the hallmarks ...

University of Exeter

As an intrinsically disordered protein, monomeric alpha-synuclein (aSyn) occupies a large conformational space. Certain conformations lead to aggregation prone and non-aggregation prone intermediates, but identifying these within the dynamic ensemble of monomeric conformations is difficult. Herein, we used the biologically relevant calcium ion to investigate the conformation of monomeric aSyn in relation to its aggregation propensity. We observe that the more exposed the N-terminus and the beginning of the NAC region of aSyn are, the more aggregation prone monomeric aSyn conformations become. Solvent exposure of the N-terminus of aSyn occurs upon release of C-terminus interactions when calcium binds, but the level of exposure and aSyn's aggregation propensity is sequence and post translational modification dependent. Identifying aggregation prone conformations of monomeric aSyn and the environmental conditions they form under will allow us to design new therapeutics targeted to the monomeric protein.

Extent of N-terminus exposure of monomeric alpha-synuclein determines its aggregation propensity.

Hydrogen/deuterium-exchange mass spectrometry (HDX-MS) experiments on protein structures can be performed at three levels: (1) by enzymatically digesting labeled proteins and analyzing the peptides (bottom-up), (2) by further fragmenting peptides following digestion (middle-down), and (3) by fragmenting the intact labeled protein (top-down) using soft gas-phase fragmentation methods, such as electron transfer dissociation (ETD). However, to the best of our knowledge, the software packages currently available for the analysis of HDX-MS data do not enable the peptide- and ETD-levels to be combined; they can only be analyzed separately. Thus, we developed HDfleX, a standalone application for the analysis of flexible high structural resolution of HDX-MS data, which allows data at any level of structural resolution (intact protein, peptide, fragment) to be merged. HDfleX features rapid experimental data fitting, robust statistical significance analyses, and optional methods for theoretical intrinsic calculations and a novel empirical correction for comparison between solution conditions.

Article	Year
Extent of N-terminus exposure of monomeric alpha-synuclein determines its aggregation propensity. Nature communications\| PubMed ID: 32499486	2020
HDfleX: Software for Flexible High Structural Resolution of Hydrogen/Deuterium-Exchange Mass Spectrometry Data. Analytical chemistry\| PubMed ID: 35263087	2022

Neeleema Seetaloo

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