Utility of immonium ions for assignment of epsilon-N-acetyllysine-containing peptides by tandem mass spectrometry

Tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) is a powerful tool for characterization of post-translationally modified proteins, including epsilon-N-acetyllysine-containing species. Previous reports indicate that epsilon-N-acetyllysine immonium ions are useful marker ions for peptides containing epsilon-N-acetyllysine, but the specificity and sensitivity of these ions for assignment of lysine acetylation by MS/MS have not been studied in detail. We investigated MS/MS data sets of 172 epsilon-N-acetyllysine tryptic peptides and 268 nonacetylated tryptic peptides to establish the utility and reliability of epsilon-N-acetyllysine immonium ions for identification and validation of acetylated peptides. Our analysis shows that the immonium ion at m/z 143 lacks specificity for lysine-acetylated peptides, whereas the derivative at m/z 126 is highly specific (98.1%). We also studied the positional effect of the epsilon-N-acetyllysine on the intensity of observed acetyllysine immonium ions. We observed an increase in acetyllysine immonium ion intensities when the acetylated lysine was N-terminally positioned in the peptide as compared to internal positions. Based on these observations we propose a validation scheme for unambiguous assignment of acetyllysine-containing peptides by MS/MS. Our analysis of epsilon-N-acetyllysine immonium ions provide a framework for investigation of MS/MS marker ion specificity and sensitivity that can be applied in studies of other types of post-translational modifications.