Issue 8, 2016

Cross-linking and other structural proteomics techniques: how chemistry is enabling mass spectrometry applications in structural biology

Abstract

The biological function of proteins is heavily influenced by their structures and their organization into assemblies such as protein complexes and regulatory networks. Mass spectrometry (MS) has been a key enabling technology for high-throughput and comprehensive protein identification and quantification on a proteome-wide scale. Besides these essential contributions, MS can also be used to study higher-order structures of biomacromolecules in a variety of ways. In one approach, intact proteins or protein complexes may be directly probed in the mass spectrometer. Alternatively, various forms of solution-phase chemistry are used to introduce modifications in intact proteins and localizing these modifications by MS analysis at the peptide level is used to derive structural information. Here, I will put a spotlight on the central role of chemistry in such mass spectrometry-based methods that bridge proteomics and structural biology, with a particular emphasis on chemical cross-linking of protein complexes.

Graphical abstract: Cross-linking and other structural proteomics techniques: how chemistry is enabling mass spectrometry applications in structural biology

Article information

Article type
Perspective
Submitted
04 Nov 2015
Accepted
25 Apr 2016
First published
26 Apr 2016
This article is Open Access

All publication charges for this article have been paid for by the Royal Society of Chemistry
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Chem. Sci., 2016,7, 4792-4803

Author version available

Cross-linking and other structural proteomics techniques: how chemistry is enabling mass spectrometry applications in structural biology

A. Leitner, Chem. Sci., 2016, 7, 4792 DOI: 10.1039/C5SC04196A

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications, without requesting further permission from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given and it is not used for commercial purposes.

To request permission to reproduce material from this article in a commercial publication, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party commercial publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements