Heparan sulfate (HS) is a class of linear, sulfated polysaccharides located on cell surface, secretory granules, and in extracellular matrices found in all animal organ systems. It consists of alternately repeating disaccharide units, expressed in animal species ranging from hydra to higher vertebrates including humans. HS binds and mediates the biological activities of over 300 proteins, including growth factors, enzymes, chemokines, cytokines, adhesion and structural proteins, lipoproteins and amyloid proteins. The binding events largely depend on the fine structure - the arrangement of sulfate groups and other variations - on HS chains. With the activated electron dissociation (ExD) high-resolution tandem mass spectrometry technique, researchers acquire rich structural information about the HS molecule. Using this technique, covalent bonds of the HS oligosaccharide ions are dissociated in the mass spectrometer. However, this information is complex, owing to the large number of product ions, and contains a degree of ambiguity due to the overlapping of product ion masses and lability of sulfate groups; as a result, there is a serious barrier to manual interpretation of the spectra. The interpretation of such data creates a serious bottleneck to the understanding of the biological roles of HS. In order to solve this problem, I designed HS-SEQ - the first HS sequencing algorithm using high-resolution tandem mass spectrometry. HS-SEQ allows rapid and confident sequencing of HS chains from millions of candidate structures and I validated its performance using multiple known pure standards. In many cases, HS oligosaccharides exist as mixtures of sulfation positional isomers. I therefore designed MULTI-HS-SEQ, an extended version of HS-SEQ targeting spectra coming from more than one HS sequence. I also developed several pre-processing and post-processing modules to support the automatic identification of HS structure. These methods and tools demonstrated the capacity for large-scale HS sequencing, which should contribute to clarifying the rich information encoded by HS chains as well as developing tailored HS drugs to target a wide spectrum of diseases.

Os peptídeos antimicrobianos tem sido alvo de cada vez mais estudos como candidatos a antibióticos naturais devido a seu amplo espectro de ação e baixa suceptibilidade a induzir resistência microbiana. Carentes de sistema imune específico, os invertebrados contam com um eficiente sistema imune inato para se defenderem de microrganismos patogênicos, incluindo uma coleção de peptídeos antimicrobianos. Através de cromatografia, ensaios antimicrobianos, espectrometria de massas e análise em banco de dados, isolou-se frações do muco de lesmas da espécie P boraceiensis com efeito antimicrobiano e obteve-se sequencias mais prováveis de fragmentos de algumas das frações ativas encontradas, relacionando-os as proteínas e peptídeos conhecidos mais similares e sugerindo relação entre as sequencias encontradas, as proteínas e peptídeos similares, bem como possível relação com atividade antimicrobiana. Obteve-se uma gama de frações ativas contra bactérias e/ou leveduras e sequências e informações relacionadas que podem ser úteis para futuros estudos de isolamento e caracterização de fatores antimicrobianos no muco de P boraceiensis. / Antimicrobial peptides are becoming increasingly more important as natural antibiotics candidates since they show a broad spectrum of action and low suceptibility to induce microbial resistance. Lacking specific imunne system, invertebrates count with an efficient innate imunne system to deffend theirselves from pathogenic microrganisms, including a collection of antimicrobial peptides. Through chromatografy, antimicrobial tests, mass spectometry and database analysis, we isolated fractions from the mucucs of P boraceiensis slugs showing antimicrobial effect. We obtained most propable sequences from several active fractions, relating them with most similar known peptides and proteins. There were sugesteg some possible connections between the found sequences and related peptides and proteins as well as possible antimicrobial activity relations. We found several active fractions against bacteria and/or yeast as well as sequences and related information that may be usefull in further isolation and caracterization studies of antimicrobial factors in P boraceiensis mucus.

Os peptídeos antimicrobianos tem sido alvo de cada vez mais estudos como candidatos a antibióticos naturais devido a seu amplo espectro de ação e baixa suceptibilidade a induzir resistência microbiana. Carentes de sistema imune específico, os invertebrados contam com um eficiente sistema imune inato para se defenderem de microrganismos patogênicos, incluindo uma coleção de peptídeos antimicrobianos. Através de cromatografia, ensaios antimicrobianos, espectrometria de massas e análise em banco de dados, isolou-se frações do muco de lesmas da espécie P boraceiensis com efeito antimicrobiano e obteve-se sequencias mais prováveis de fragmentos de algumas das frações ativas encontradas, relacionando-os as proteínas e peptídeos conhecidos mais similares e sugerindo relação entre as sequencias encontradas, as proteínas e peptídeos similares, bem como possível relação com atividade antimicrobiana. Obteve-se uma gama de frações ativas contra bactérias e/ou leveduras e sequências e informações relacionadas que podem ser úteis para futuros estudos de isolamento e caracterização de fatores antimicrobianos no muco de P boraceiensis. / Antimicrobial peptides are becoming increasingly more important as natural antibiotics candidates since they show a broad spectrum of action and low suceptibility to induce microbial resistance. Lacking specific imunne system, invertebrates count with an efficient innate imunne system to deffend theirselves from pathogenic microrganisms, including a collection of antimicrobial peptides. Through chromatografy, antimicrobial tests, mass spectometry and database analysis, we isolated fractions from the mucucs of P boraceiensis slugs showing antimicrobial effect. We obtained most propable sequences from several active fractions, relating them with most similar known peptides and proteins. There were sugesteg some possible connections between the found sequences and related peptides and proteins as well as possible antimicrobial activity relations. We found several active fractions against bacteria and/or yeast as well as sequences and related information that may be usefull in further isolation and caracterization studies of antimicrobial factors in P boraceiensis mucus.

<p>In the growing field of proteomics identification of proteins by tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) is performed by matching experimental mass spectra against calculated spectra of all possible peptides in a protein database. One problem with this approach is the false-positive identifications. MS-based proteomics experiments are further affected by a rather poor efficiency typical in the range of 10-15%, implicating that only a low percentage of acquired mass spectrometric data is significantly identified and assigned a peptide sequence.</p><p>In this thesis improvement in spectrum specificity is accomplished by using a combination of high-accuracy mass spectrometry and techniques that will yield complementary sequence information. Performing collision-activated dissociation (CAD) and electron capture dissociation (ECD) upon the same peptide ion will yield such complementary sequence information. Implementing this into a proteomics approach and showing the advantages of using complementary fragmentation techniques for improving peptide identification is shown. Furthermore, a novel database-independent score is introduced (S-score) based upon the maximum length of the peptide sequence tag derived from complementary use of CAD and ECD. The S-score can be used to separate poor quality spectra from good quality spectra. An-other aspect of the S-score is the development of the ‘reliable sequence tag’ which can be used to recover below threshold identifications and for a reliable backbone for de novo sequencing of peptides.</p><p>A novel proteomics-grade de novo sequencing algorithm has also been developed based upon the RST, which can retrieve peptide identification with the highest reliability (>95%). Furthermore, a novel software tool for unbiased identifications of any post-translational modifications present in a peptide sample is introduced (ModifiComb). Combining all the tools described in this thesis increases the identification specificity (>30 times), recovers false-negative identifications and increases the overall efficiency of proteomics experiements to above 40%. Currently one of the highest achieved in large-scale proteomics.</p>

In the growing field of proteomics identification of proteins by tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) is performed by matching experimental mass spectra against calculated spectra of all possible peptides in a protein database. One problem with this approach is the false-positive identifications. MS-based proteomics experiments are further affected by a rather poor efficiency typical in the range of 10-15%, implicating that only a low percentage of acquired mass spectrometric data is significantly identified and assigned a peptide sequence. In this thesis improvement in spectrum specificity is accomplished by using a combination of high-accuracy mass spectrometry and techniques that will yield complementary sequence information. Performing collision-activated dissociation (CAD) and electron capture dissociation (ECD) upon the same peptide ion will yield such complementary sequence information. Implementing this into a proteomics approach and showing the advantages of using complementary fragmentation techniques for improving peptide identification is shown. Furthermore, a novel database-independent score is introduced (S-score) based upon the maximum length of the peptide sequence tag derived from complementary use of CAD and ECD. The S-score can be used to separate poor quality spectra from good quality spectra. An-other aspect of the S-score is the development of the ‘reliable sequence tag’ which can be used to recover below threshold identifications and for a reliable backbone for de novo sequencing of peptides. A novel proteomics-grade de novo sequencing algorithm has also been developed based upon the RST, which can retrieve peptide identification with the highest reliability (&gt;95%). Furthermore, a novel software tool for unbiased identifications of any post-translational modifications present in a peptide sample is introduced (ModifiComb). Combining all the tools described in this thesis increases the identification specificity (&gt;30 times), recovers false-negative identifications and increases the overall efficiency of proteomics experiements to above 40%. Currently one of the highest achieved in large-scale proteomics.

L’analyse protéomique consiste en l’analyse qualitative et quantitative de l’ensemble des protéines exprimées dans une cellule ou tissu dans des conditions données (protéome). Les progrès instrumentaux en spectrométrie de masse et les avancées bioinformatiques des dernières années ont permis d’imposer ce domaine dans les sciences de la vie. Diverses stratégies protéomiques permettent ainsi, aujourd’hui, d’identifier et quantifier plusieurs centaines/milliers de protéines dans un échantillon complexe, ce qui permet classiquement de caractériser les états physiopathologiques. En revanche, la protéomique est un outil émergent en biologie évolutive. Ce domaine vise à comprendre les déterminants de la diversité des organismes présents sur Terre et de leur « fonctionnement », notamment leurs adaptations à certaines contraintes environnementales.L’objectif de cette thèse était d’étudier, de l’organe à l’écosystème, les variations protéomiques induites par des changements environnementaux, tout en adaptant les différentes étapes de l’analyse à chaque type d’échantillons, à chaque organisme, de la préparation d’échantillons à l’analyse des données. Grâce à la mise en place d’une stratégie de séquençage de novo quantitative originale, ces travaux de thèse ont été l’occasion d’étudier le rôle du tissu adipeux brun dans la protection contre l’obésité chez le campagnol, espèce dont le génome n’est pas séquencé. D’autres traits particuliers ont été explorés, tels que l’obésité réversible du microcèbe, ou encore les interactions entre socialité et longévité chez la fourmi. Les solutions logicielles envisagées ne permettant de quantifier de manière robuste des peptides identifiés par séquençage de novo à partir d’échantillons fractionnés, nous avons ainsi établi que le préfractionnement permet d’obtenir une meilleure couverture de protéome. En revanche, sans préfractionnement, le séquençage de novo produit un gain indéniable. Enfin, en étudiant le métaprotéome de communautés biotiques des sols alpins, nous avons mis en évidence l’intérêt de combiner protéomique et génomique, afin d’établir la banque de données protéiques la plus appropriée, mais aussi pour « valider » les données protéomiques. / Proteomics analysis corresponds to the qualitative and quantitative analysis of all proteins expressed in a cell or tissue under given conditions (proteome). Instrumental progresses in mass spectrometry and bioinformatics advances in recent years have allowed its establishment in life sciences. Diverse proteomics strategies thus allow identification and quantification of hundreds/thousands of proteins in complex samples, which classically allows physiopathological states to be characterized. However, proteomics is only emerging in the evolutionary biology field. This field aims at understanding the determinants of the diversity of organisms present on Earth and their “functioning”, including their adaptations to certain environmental constraints.The objective of this thesis was to study, from the organ to the eco-system, the proteomic variations induced by environmental changes, while adapting the different steps of the analysis to each type of sample, each organism, from sample preparation to data analysis. Through the introduction of an original quantitative de novo sequencing strategy, we studied the role of brown adipose tissue against obesity in a non-sequenced species: the vole. Other particular traits were explored, such as the reversible obesity of the grey mouse lemur or the interactions between sociality and longevity in the ant. The considered software solutions did not allow to robustly quantify peptides identified by de novo sequencing from fractionated samples, we thus determined that prefractionation allows for better proteome coverage. On the other hand, without prefractionation, de novo sequencing produces an undeniable gain. Finally, by studying the metaproteome of alpine soil biotic communities, we have highlighted the advantage of combining proteomics and genomics, in order to establish the most appropriate protein database and to “validate” proteomics data.

No description available.

L’immunité adaptive et la discrimination entre le soi et le non-soi chez les vertébrés à mâchoire reposent sur la présentation de peptides par les récepteurs d’histocompatibilité majeur de classe I. Les peptides antigéniques, présentés par les molécules du complexe d’histocompatibilité (CMH), sont scrutés par les lymphocytes T CD8 pour une réponse immunitaire appropriée. Le répertoire des peptides du CMH de classe I, aussi appelé immunopeptidome, est généré par la dégradation protéosomale des protéines endogènes, et a un rôle essentiel dans la régulation de l’immunité cellulaire. La composition de l’immunopeptidome dépend du type de cellule et peut présenter des caractéristiques liées à des maladies comme le cancer. Les peptides antigéniques peuvent être utilisés à des fins immunothérapeutiques notamment dans le traitement voire la prévention de certains cancers. La spectrométrie de masse est un outil de choix pour l’identification, le séquençage et la caractérisation de ces peptides. Cependant, la composition en acides aminés, la faible abondance et la diversité de ces peptides compliquent leur détection et leur séquençage. Nous avons développé un programme appelé StatPeaks qui permet de calculer un certains nombres de statistiques relatives à la fragmentation des peptides. À l’aide de ce programme, nous montrons sans équivoque que les peptides du CMH classe I, en mode de fragmentation par dissociation induite par collision (CID), fragmentent très différemment des peptides trypsiques communément utilisés en protéomique. Néanmoins, la fragmentation par décomposition induite par collision à plus haute énergie (HCD) proposée par le spectromètre LTQ-Orbitrap Velos améliore la fragmentation et fournit une haute résolution qui permet d’obtenir une meilleure confiance dans l’identification des peptides du CMH de classe I. Cet avantage permet d’effectuer le séquençage de novo pour identifier les variants polymorphes qui ne sont normalement pas identifiés par les recherches utilisant des bases de données. La comparaison des programmes de séquençage Lutefisk, pepNovo, pNovo, Vonode et Peaks met en évidence que le dernier permet d’identifier un plus grand nombre de peptides du CMH de classe I. Ce programme est intégré dans une chaîne de traitement de recherche d’antigènes mineurs d’histocompatibilité. Enfin, une base de données contenant les informations spectrales de plusieurs centaines de peptides du CMH de classe I accessible par Internet a été développée. / Adaptive immunity and discrimination between self and nonself in jawed vertebrates relies on the presentation of peptides by the major histocompatibility (MHC) class I receptors. Foreign or self peptide antigens presented by the MHC molecules are probed by CD8 T-cell lymphocyte for proper immune response. The repertoire of MHC I peptides collectively referred to as the immunopeptidome is generated through the proteasomal degradation of endogenous proteins and plays an important role in the regulation of cellular immunity. The composition of the immunopeptidome is cell specific and can harbor important hallmark of human diseases including cancer. Antigenic peptides can also be used in immunotherapy to mount an appropriate immune response against cancer cells displaying these peptides. Mass spectrometry is a tool of choice for the identification, sequencing and characterization of these peptides. However, the amino acid composition, the low abundance and diversity of these peptides make their detection and sequencing more challenging. We developed a software, called StatPeaks, that calculates statistics relative to the fragmentation of peptides. Using this software, we demonstrate that under collision induced dissociation (CID) MHC class I peptides fragment in a very different fashion than tryptic peptides, commonly used in proteomics. However, the higher-energy collisional dissociation (HCD) mode available on the LTQ-Orbitrap Velos enhances peptide fragmentation and provides high resolution fragment information that significantly improves the confidence in MHC class I peptide identification. This inherent advantage confers the ability to perform de novo sequencing to identify polymorphic variants that would normally elude conventional database searches. The comparison of de novo peptide sequencing software Lutefisk, pepNovo, pNovo, Vonode and Peaks indicated that the later software enabled higher rates of correct identification for MHC class I peptides. This software was integrated into a data analysis pipeline for the identification minor histocompatibility antigens (MiHAs). A web-based library that stores spectral information of hundreds of synthetic MHC class I peptides was developed in support to the needs of the immunopeptidome discovery program.

L’immunité adaptive et la discrimination entre le soi et le non-soi chez les vertébrés à mâchoire reposent sur la présentation de peptides par les récepteurs d’histocompatibilité majeur de classe I. Les peptides antigéniques, présentés par les molécules du complexe d’histocompatibilité (CMH), sont scrutés par les lymphocytes T CD8 pour une réponse immunitaire appropriée. Le répertoire des peptides du CMH de classe I, aussi appelé immunopeptidome, est généré par la dégradation protéosomale des protéines endogènes, et a un rôle essentiel dans la régulation de l’immunité cellulaire. La composition de l’immunopeptidome dépend du type de cellule et peut présenter des caractéristiques liées à des maladies comme le cancer. Les peptides antigéniques peuvent être utilisés à des fins immunothérapeutiques notamment dans le traitement voire la prévention de certains cancers. La spectrométrie de masse est un outil de choix pour l’identification, le séquençage et la caractérisation de ces peptides. Cependant, la composition en acides aminés, la faible abondance et la diversité de ces peptides compliquent leur détection et leur séquençage. Nous avons développé un programme appelé StatPeaks qui permet de calculer un certains nombres de statistiques relatives à la fragmentation des peptides. À l’aide de ce programme, nous montrons sans équivoque que les peptides du CMH classe I, en mode de fragmentation par dissociation induite par collision (CID), fragmentent très différemment des peptides trypsiques communément utilisés en protéomique. Néanmoins, la fragmentation par décomposition induite par collision à plus haute énergie (HCD) proposée par le spectromètre LTQ-Orbitrap Velos améliore la fragmentation et fournit une haute résolution qui permet d’obtenir une meilleure confiance dans l’identification des peptides du CMH de classe I. Cet avantage permet d’effectuer le séquençage de novo pour identifier les variants polymorphes qui ne sont normalement pas identifiés par les recherches utilisant des bases de données. La comparaison des programmes de séquençage Lutefisk, pepNovo, pNovo, Vonode et Peaks met en évidence que le dernier permet d’identifier un plus grand nombre de peptides du CMH de classe I. Ce programme est intégré dans une chaîne de traitement de recherche d’antigènes mineurs d’histocompatibilité. Enfin, une base de données contenant les informations spectrales de plusieurs centaines de peptides du CMH de classe I accessible par Internet a été développée. / Adaptive immunity and discrimination between self and nonself in jawed vertebrates relies on the presentation of peptides by the major histocompatibility (MHC) class I receptors. Foreign or self peptide antigens presented by the MHC molecules are probed by CD8 T-cell lymphocyte for proper immune response. The repertoire of MHC I peptides collectively referred to as the immunopeptidome is generated through the proteasomal degradation of endogenous proteins and plays an important role in the regulation of cellular immunity. The composition of the immunopeptidome is cell specific and can harbor important hallmark of human diseases including cancer. Antigenic peptides can also be used in immunotherapy to mount an appropriate immune response against cancer cells displaying these peptides. Mass spectrometry is a tool of choice for the identification, sequencing and characterization of these peptides. However, the amino acid composition, the low abundance and diversity of these peptides make their detection and sequencing more challenging. We developed a software, called StatPeaks, that calculates statistics relative to the fragmentation of peptides. Using this software, we demonstrate that under collision induced dissociation (CID) MHC class I peptides fragment in a very different fashion than tryptic peptides, commonly used in proteomics. However, the higher-energy collisional dissociation (HCD) mode available on the LTQ-Orbitrap Velos enhances peptide fragmentation and provides high resolution fragment information that significantly improves the confidence in MHC class I peptide identification. This inherent advantage confers the ability to perform de novo sequencing to identify polymorphic variants that would normally elude conventional database searches. The comparison of de novo peptide sequencing software Lutefisk, pepNovo, pNovo, Vonode and Peaks indicated that the later software enabled higher rates of correct identification for MHC class I peptides. This software was integrated into a data analysis pipeline for the identification minor histocompatibility antigens (MiHAs). A web-based library that stores spectral information of hundreds of synthetic MHC class I peptides was developed in support to the needs of the immunopeptidome discovery program.

L’analyse protéomique par spectrométrie de masse s’est imposée comme une méthode incontournable pour la caractérisation des protéines. Grâce aux progrès de l’instrumentation et de la bioinformatique, l’interprétation automatisée des spectres MS/MS permet aujourd’hui d’identifier des milliers de protéines dans un type cellulaire. Cependant, cette méthodologie s’applique encore difficilement aux organismes dont les génomes n’ont pas été séquencés, et donc pour lesquels il n’existe pas de banques de séquences peptidiques de référence. Notre travail a porté sur le développement et l’application d’une méthodologie d’interprétation des données MS/MS pour les organismes à génomes non séquencés. Cette méthodologie est basée sur le séquençage de novo suivi de recherche MS-BLAST. Ainsi nous avons pu : Identifier les différents partenaires de complexes protéiques tels que les protéines des complexes TgGAP50, TgAlba, TgSORTLR impliqués dans la motilité, la virulence ou le trafic intracellulaire des protéines du parasite Toxoplasma gondii, Identifier et caractériser des variants d’hémoglobine humaine, Identifier les protéines différentiellement exprimées lors des interactions vigne et champignons à génomes non séquencés dans la maladie de l’esca, Caractériser finement la N-glycosylation de l’invertase vacuolaire du raisin. Nous avons pu réaliser nos études sur des échantillons d’origines très différentes : homme, plantes, champignons, parasites et nous avons apporté des éléments de réponses moléculaires aux questions biologiques. / The proteomic analysis by mass spectrometry is now an essential method for the characterization of proteins. Thanks to advances in instrumentation and bioinformatics, automated interpretation of MS/MS spectra can now identify thousands of proteins in a cell type. However, this methodology remains poorly applied to the organisms that genomes are not sequenced and therefore where there is no database of reference for peptides sequences. Our work has focused on the development and application of a methodology for the interpretation of MS/MS data for the organisms that genomes are not sequenced. This methodology is based on the de novo sequencing followed by MS-BLAST search. Thus we have: Identify different partners of protein complexes such as proteins TgGAP50, TgAlba and TgSORTLR complex, involved in motility, virulence or intracellular protein trafficking of Toxoplasma gondii, Identify and characterize human hemoglobin variants, Identify the proteins differentially expressed during interaction of vines and fungi that genomes are not sequenced in esca disease, Finely characterize the N-glycosylation of the grape vacuolar invertase. We have achieved our studies on samples of very different origins: human, plants, fungi, parasites, and we provided evidence of molecular responses to biological questions.