Protein modifications by electrophilic lipoxidation products: Adduct formation, chemical strategies and tandem mass spectrometry for their detection and identification

This is an author's peer-reviewed final manuscript, as accepted by the publisher. The published article is copyrighted by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. and can be found at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/%28ISSN%291098-2787.The post-translational modification of proteins by electrophilic oxylipids is emerging as an important mechanism that contributes to the complexity of proteomes. Enzymatic and non-enzymatic oxidation of biological lipids results in the formation of chemically diverse electrophilic carbonyl compounds, such as 2-alkenals and 4-hydroxy alkenals, epoxides and eicosanoids with reactive cyclopentenone structures. These lipoxidation products are capable of modifying proteins. Originally considered solely as markers of oxidative insult, more recently the modifications of proteins by lipid peroxidation products are being recognized as a new mechanism of cell signaling with relevance to redox homeostasis, adaptive response and inflammatory resolution. The growing interest in protein modifications by reactive oxylipid species necessitates the availability of methods that are capable of detecting, identifying and characterizing these protein adducts in biological samples with high complexity. However, the efficient analysis of these chemically diverse proteins presents a considerable analytical challenge. We first provide an introduction into the chemistry and biological relevance of the protein adduction by electrophilic lipoxidation products. We then provide an overview of tandem mass spectrometry approaches that have been developed in recent years for the interrogation of protein modifications by electrophilic oxylipid species