Identification of c-type heme-containing peptides using nonactivated immobilized metal affinity chromatography resin enrichment and higher-energy collisional dissociation.

The c-type cytochromes play essential roles in many biological activities of both prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells, including electron transfer, enzyme catalysis, and induction of apoptosis. We report a novel enrichment strategy for identifying c-type heme-containing peptides that uses nonactivated IMAC resin. The strategy demonstrated at least 7-fold enrichment for heme-containing peptides digested from a cytochrome c protein standard, and quantitative linear performance was also assessed for heme-containing peptide enrichment. Heme-containing peptides extracted from the periplasmic fraction of Shewanella oneidensis MR-1 were further identified using higher-energy collisional dissociation tandem mass spectrometry. The results demonstrated the applicability of this enrichment strategy to identify c-type heme-containing peptides from a highly complex biological sample and, at the same time, confirmed the periplasmic localization of heme-containing proteins during suboxic respiration activities of S. oneidensis MR-1.