Neuropeptidomics: Mass spectrometry-based qualitative and quantitative analysis

Neuropeptidomics refers to a global characterization approach for the investigation of neuropeptides, often under specific physiological conditions. Neuropeptides comprise a complex set of signaling molecules that are involved in regulatory functions and behavioral control in the nervous system. Neuropeptidomics is inherently challenging because neuropeptides are spatially, temporally and chemically heterogeneous, making them difficult to predict in silico from genomic information. Mature neuropeptides are produced from intricate enzymatic processing of precursor proteins/prohormones via a range of post-translational modifications, resulting in multiple final peptide products from each prohormone gene. Although there are several methods for targeted peptide studies, mass spectrometry (MS), with its qualitative and quantitative capabilities, is ideally suited to the task. MS provides fast, sensitive, accurate, and high-throughput peptidomic analyses of neuropeptides without requiring prior knowledge of the peptide sequences. Aided by liquid chromatography (LC) separations and bioinformatics, MS is quickly becoming a leading technique in neuropeptidomics. This chapter describes several LC-MS analytical methods to identify, characterize and quantify neuropeptides, while emphasizing the sample preparation steps so integral to experimental success.