PNNL

Abstract

Aspartic acid (Asp)-containing peptides with the fixed charge derivative tris(2,4,6-trimethoxyphenyl) phosphonium (tTMP-P+) were explored computationally and experimentally by H/D exchange and fragmentation studies in order to probe the phenomenon of selective cleavage C-terminal to Asp in the absence of a "mobile" proton. Ab initio modeling of the tTMP-P+ electrostatic potential demonstrates the positive charge is distributed on the phosphonium group and therefore is not initiating or directing fragmentation as would a "mobile" proton. Geometry optimizations and vibrational analyses of different aspartic acid conformations show the aspartic acid structure with a hydrogen bond between the side chain hydroxy and backbone carbonyl lies 2.8 kcal/mol above the lowest energy conformer. In reactions with D2O, the phosphonium-derived doubly charged peptide (H+)P+LDIFSDF rapidly exchanges all 12 of its exchangeable hydrogens for deuterium and also displays a non-exchanging population. With no added proton, P+LDIFSDF exchanges a maximum of four of eleven exchangeable hydrogens for deuterium. No exchange is observed when all acidic groups are converted to the corresponding methyl esters. Together, these H/D exchange results indicate that the acidic hydrogens are "mobile locally" because they are able to participate in exchange even in the absence of an added proton. Fragmentation of two distinct (H+)P+LDIFSDF ion populations shows the non-exchanging population displays selective cleavage, while the exchanging population fragments more evenly across the peptide backbone. This result demonstrates that H/D exchange can sometimes distinguish between and provide a means of separation of different protonation motifs, and that these protonation motifs can have an effect on the fragmentation.