Analysis of bioactive peptides by liquid chromatography-high-resolution electrospray mass spectrometry

LC-high-resolution electrospray ionization (ESI)-MS data for a number of bioactive peptides, including substance P and bradykinins were acquired over a wide mass range by scanning the magnetic sector and calibrating externally with polyethylene glycol standards. Multiply charged ions were observed and errors between observed and theoretical monoisotopic molecular masses were typically in the 5 to 30 ppm range for the peptides during LC-ESI-MS and ESI-MS operation with magnetic sector resolutions between 2500 and 6000 (10% valley definition). Under collisionally activated dissociation conditions bn- and yn-series sequence ions were generally observed, enabling amino acid sequencing and the differentiation of lysine from glutamine, two amino acids differing in residue mass by only 0.0364 u. Mass accuracy was evaluated during an international round robin analytical exercise where the molecular masses of five unknown peptides were to be accurately determined. Isotopic clusters for charge states of up to +6 were fully resolved, facilitating the rapid and unambiguous assignment of charge states and calculation of monoisotopic molecular masses. Errors between theoretical and observed monoisotopic molecular masses were in the 2 to 18 ppm range for the five unknown peptides.