PNNL

Abstract

Reversible protein phosphorylation is a central cellular regulatory mechanism in modulating protein activity and propagating signals within cellular pathways and networks. Development of more effective methods for the simultaneous identification of phosphorylation sites and quantification of temporal changes in protein phosphorylation could provide important insights into molecular signaling mechanisms in a variety of different cellular processes. Here we present an integrated quantitative phosphoproteomics approach and its applications for comparative analysis of Cos-7 cells in response to lysophosphatidic acid (LPA) gradient stimulation. The approach combines trypsin-catalyzed 16O/18O labeling plus 16O/18O-methanol esterification labeling for quantitation, a macro- Immobilized Metal-ion Affinity Chromatography trap for phosphopeptide enrichment, and a monolithic capillary column with integrated electrospray emitter. LC separation and MS/MS is followed by neutral loss-dependent MS/MS/MS for phosphopeptide identification using a linear ion trap (LTQ)-FT mass spectrometer and complementary searching algorithms for interpreting MS/MS spectra. Protein phosphorylation involved in various signaling pathways of cell migration were identified and quantified, such as mitogen-activated protein kinase 1, dual-specificity mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase 2, and dual-specificity tyrosine-phosphorylation regulated kinase 1b, and a number of Rho GTPase-activating proteins. These results demonstrate the efficiency of this quantitative phosphoproteomics approach and its application for rapid discovery of phosphorylation events associated with gradient sensing and cell chemotaxis.