Aquaporin-0-protein interactions elucidated by crosslinking mass spectrometry

Aquaporin-0 (AQP0) constitutes 50 % of the lens membrane proteome and plays important roles in lens fiber cell adhesion, water permeability, and lens transparency. Previous work has shown that specific proteins, such as calmodulin (CaM), interact with AQP0 to modulate its water permeability; however, these studies often used AQP0 peptides, rather than full-length protein, to probe these interactions. Furthermore, the specific regions of interaction of several known AQP0 interacting partners, i.e. αA and αB-crystallins, and phakinin (CP49) remain unknown. The purpose of this study was to use crosslinking mass spectrometry (XL-MS) to identify interacting proteins with full-length AQP0 in crude lens cortical membrane fractions and to determine the specific protein regions of interaction. Our results demonstrate, for the first time, that the AQP0 N-terminus can engage in protein interactions. Specific regions of interaction are elucidated for several AQP0 interacting partners including phakinin, α-crystallin, connexin-46, and connexin-50. In addition, two new interacting partners, vimentin and connexin-46, were identified.