Junjie Hou

Proteomic analysis of mitochondria from Caenorhabditis elegans

Mitochondria play essential roles in cell physiological processes including energy production, metabolism, ion homeostasis, cell growth, aging and apoptosis. Proteomic strategies have been applied to the study of mitochondria since 1998; these studies have yielded decisive information about the diverse physiological functions of the organelle. As an ideal model biological system, the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans has been widely used in the study of several diseases, such as metabolic diseases and cancer. However, the mitochondrial proteome of C. elegans remains elusive. In this study, we purified mitochondria from C. elegans and performed a comprehensive proteomic analysis using the shotgun proteomic approach. A total of 1117 proteins have been identified with at least two unique peptides. Their physicochemical and functional characteristics, subcellular locations, related biological processes, and associations with human diseases, especially Parkinsons disease, are discussed. An orthology comparison was also performed between C. elegans and four other model organisms for a general depiction of the conservation of mitochondrial proteins during evolution. This study will provide new clues for understanding the role of mitochondria in the physiological and pathological processes of C. elegans.

Preliminary quantitative profile of differential protein expression between rat L6 myoblasts and myotubes by stable isotope labeling with amino acids in cell culture

Defining the mechanisms governing myogenesis has advanced in recent years. Skeletal‐muscle differentiation is a multi‐step process controlled spatially and temporally by various factors at the transcription level. To explore those factors involved in myogenesis, stable isotope labeling with amino acids in cell culture (SILAC), coupled with high‐accuracy mass spectrometry (LTQ‐Orbitrap), was applied successfully. Rat L6 cell line is an excellent model system for studying muscle myogenesis in vitro. When mononucleate L6 myoblast cells reach confluence in culture plate, they could transform into multinucleate myotubes by serum starvation. By comparing protein expression of L6 myoblasts and terminally differentiated multinucleated myotubes, 1170 proteins were quantified and 379 proteins changed significantly in fully differentiated myotubes in contrast to myoblasts. These differentially expressed proteins are mainly involved in inter‐or intracellular signaling, protein synthesis and degradation, protein folding, cell adhesion and extracelluar matrix, cell structure and motility, metabolism, substance transportation, etc. These findings were supported by many previous studies on myogenic differentiation, of which many up‐regulated proteins were found to be involved in promoting skeletal muscle differentiation for the first time in our study. In summary, our results provide new clues for understanding the mechanism of myogenesis.

Phosphoproteome analysis of rat L6 myotubes using reversed-phase C18 prefractionation and titanium dioxide enrichment.

The rat L6 myotubes is an important in vitro model system for studying signaling pathways in skeletal muscle. Exploring phosphorylation events involved in the skeletal muscle is very significant for elucidating the kinase-substrate relationship, understanding regulatory mechanisms involved in signaling pathways and providing insights into numerous cell processes. Here, we used mass spectrometry-based proteomics to conduct global phosphoproteome profiling of rat L6 myotubes. Using an efficient phosphoproteomic strategy including prefractionation of tryptic peptide mixtures with self-packed RP C18 columns, phosphopeptide enrichment with TiO(2), and 2D-LC (SCX/RP)-MS/MS analysis, a total of 2230 unique phosphopeptides from 1195 proteins were identified with a false-discovery rate of less than 1.0% using a target/decoy database searching strategy. After determining the degree of certainty of the phosphorylation site location (Ascore value >or=19), 11 Ser motifs and one Thr motif were derived from our data set using the Motif-X algorithm. Several potential signaling pathways were found in our myotubes phosphoproteome, such as the MAPK signaling pathway and the IGF-1/Insulin signaling pathway.

The profile of mitochondrial proteins and their phosphorylation signaling network in INS-1 β cells

Mitochondria have important roles in cellular physiological functions and various diseases. In pancreatic beta cells, mitochondria play a central role in glucose-stimulated insulin secretion (GSIS). To reveal the potential functions of mitochondria in the GSIS process in beta cells, shotgun proteomics was applied to profiling mitochondrial proteins and their potential phosphorylation sites in rat INS-1 cells. More than 800 proteins were assigned to mitochondria. In addition, 84 different mitochondrial phosphoproteins were identified, and 52 upstream kinases of mitochondrial phosphoproteins were predicted using bioinformatics tools. Regulation networks of mitochondrial phosphoproteins were constructed by integrating mitochondrial protein interaction networks and mitochondrial phosphorylation signaling, providing a preliminary survey of how phosphorylation signaling regulates mitochondrial function in beta cells. We present integrated resources including the protein composition and signaling pathways of mitochondria which can be used to understand the role of mitochondria in GSIS.

Mammalian mitochondrial proteomics: insights into mitochondrial functions and mitochondria-related diseases

Mitochondria are organelles that are essential for cell life and death. A huge range of pathologies, including neurodegenerative diseases, cancer, diabetes and aging, have been reported to be associated with mitochondrial dysfunction. Therefore, identification of mitochondrial proteins that are differentially expressed in these pathologies will help to further our understanding of these diseases. In recent years, great achievements have been made in mammalian mitochondrial proteomics. Here we provide an overview of the current state of knowledge with respect to the whole mitochondrial proteome, the mitochondrial subproteome, mitochondrial complexes and mitochondrial post-translational modifications. Applications of comparative mitochondrial proteomics to various pathologies that have provided clues for understanding the relationship between mitochondrial dysfunction and pathogenesis are described. We conclude that mitochondrial proteomics can be used not only to map all the components of mitochondria, but can also provide information for discovering therapeutic targets for mitochondria-related diseases.

Chronic high glucose induced INS‐1β cell mitochondrial dysfunction: A comparative mitochondrial proteome with SILAC

As glucose‐stimulated insulin secretion of pancreatic β cell is triggered and promoted by the metabolic messengers derived from mitochondria, mitochondria take a central stage in the normal function of β cells. β cells in diabetics were chronically exposed to hyperglycemia stimulation, which have been reported to exert deleterious effects on β‐cell mitochondria. However, the mechanism of the toxic effects of hyperglycemia on β‐cell mitochondria was not clear. In this study, we characterized the biological functional changes of rat INS‐1β cells and their mitochondria with chronic exposure to hyperglycemia and created a research model of chronic hyperglycemia‐induced dysfunctional β cells with damaged mitochondria. Then, SILAC‐based quantitative proteomic approach was used to compare the mitochondrial protein expression from high glucose treated INS‐1β cells and control cells. The expression of some mitochondrial proteins was found with significant changes. Functional classification revealed most of these proteins were related with oxidative phosphorylation, mitochondrial protein biosynthesis, substances metabolism, transport, and cell death. These results presented some useful information about the effect of glucotoxicity on the β‐cell mitochondria.

Acyl-biotinyl Exchange Chemistry and Mass Spectrometry-Based Analysis of Palmitoylation Sites of In Vitro Palmitoylated Rat Brain Tubulin

Research has shown that the palmitoyl group of α-tubulin mediates the hydrophobic interaction between microtubules and intracellular membranes and that palmitoylated tubulin plays a role in signal transduction. There are 20 cysteine residues per α/β tubulin heterodimer. C376 of α-tubulin was reported to be predominantly palmitoylated and C20, C213 and C305 of α-tubulin were palmitoylated at lower levels. The previous method used for the analysis of the palmitoylation sites on α-tubulin was based on 3H-labeling, enzymolysis, purification and sequencing. This approach, although efficient, is laborious. Mass spectrometry (MS), especially tandem MS, has been shown to be a successful method for identification of various post-translational modifications of proteins. We report here a convenient MS-based method to comprehensively analyze the palmitoylation sites of the α/β tubulin heterodimer. Acyl-biotinyl exchange chemistry and streptavidin agarose affinity purification were applied to enrich palmitoylated peptides from tubulin. After nano-LC-MS/MS analysis, database searching and manual analysis of the spectra revealed that 11 cysteine residues of the α/β tubulin heterodimer were palmitoylated.

Purification, identification and profiling of serum amyloid A proteins from sera of advanced-stage cancer patients

Abstract Surface-enhanced laser desorption/ionization time of flight mass spectrometry (SELDI-TOF-MS) is a powerful tool for screening potential biomarkers of various pathological conditions. However, low resolution and mass accuracy of SELDI-TOF-MS remain a major obstacle for determination of biological identities of potential protein biomarkers. We report here a refined workflow that combines ZipTip desalting, acetonitrile precipitation, high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) separation and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time of flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS) analysis for the profiling, purification and identification of the targeted serum proteins found by SELDI-TOF-MS. By using this workflow, we purified ten targeted proteins from the sera of patients with various types of advanced stage (stage III–IV) cancers. These proteins were identified as isoforms of the human serum amyloid protein A (SAA) family with or without truncations at their N-terminals. This was confirmed by Western blot analysis. Different SAA expression patterns were observed by MALDI-TOF-MS profiling. SAA has long been reported as a biomarker for various cancer types such as lung cancer, ovarian cancer, and breast cancer. However, in this study we found increased SAA expression in the sera of advanced-stage cancer patients with different cancer types. Our results suggest that maybe SAA should not be used alone as a biomarker for any specific cancer type.

Enhanced MALDI-TOF MS Analysis of Phosphopeptides Using an Optimized DHAP/DAHC Matrix

Selecting an appropriate matrix solution is one of the most effective means of increasing the ionization efficiency of phosphopeptides in matrix-assisted laser-desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS). In this study, we systematically assessed matrix combinations of 2, 6-dihydroxyacetophenone (DHAP) and diammonium hydrogen citrate (DAHC), and demonstrated that the low ratio DHAP/DAHC matrix was more effective in enhancing the ionization of phosphopeptides. Low femtomole level of phosphopeptides from the tryptic digests of α-casein and β-casein was readily detected by MALDI-TOF-MS in both positive and negative ion mode without desalination or phosphopeptide enrichment. Compared with the DHB/PA matrix, the optimized DHAP/DAHC matrix yielded superior sample homogeneity and higher phosphopeptide measurement sensitivity, particularly when multiple phosphorylated peptides were assessed. Finally, the DHAP/DAHC matrix was applied to identify phosphorylation sites from α-casein and β-casein and to characterize two phosphorylation sites from the human histone H1 treated with Cyclin-Dependent Kinase-1 (CDK1) by MALDI-TOF/TOF MS.

A new dimethyl labeling-based SID-MRM-MS method and its application to three proteases involved in insulin maturation

The absolute quantification of target proteins in proteomics involves stable isotope dilution coupled with multiple reactions monitoring mass spectrometry (SID-MRM-MS). The successful preparation of stable isotope-labeled internal standard peptides is an important prerequisite for the SID-MRM absolute quantification methods. Dimethyl labeling has been widely used in relative quantitative proteomics and it is fast, simple, reliable, cost-effective, and applicable to any protein sample, making it an ideal candidate method for the preparation of stable isotope-labeled internal standards. MRM mass spectrometry is of high sensitivity, specificity, and throughput characteristics and can quantify multiple proteins simultaneously, including low-abundance proteins in precious samples such as pancreatic islets. In this study, a new method for the absolute quantification of three proteases involved in insulin maturation, namely PC1/3, PC2 and CPE, was developed by coupling a stable isotope dimethyl labeling strategy for internal standard peptide preparation with SID-MRM-MS quantitative technology. This method offers a new and effective approach for deep understanding of the functional status of pancreatic β cells and pathogenesis in diabetes.