In vitro MS-based proteomic analysis and absolute quantification of neuronal-glial injury biomarkers in cell culture system.

MS-based proteomics has been the method of choice for biomarker discovery in the field of traumatic brain injury (TBI). Due to its high sensitivity and specificity, MS is now being explored for biomarker quantitative validation in tissue and biofluids. In this study, we demonstrate the use of MS in both qualitative protein identification and targeted detection of acute TBI biomarkers released from degenerating cultured rat cortical mixed neuronal cells, mimicking intracellular fluid in the central nervous system after TBI. Calpain activation was induced by cell treatment with maitotoxin (MTX), a known calcium channel opener. Separate plates of mixed neuronal-glial culture were subjected to excitotoxin N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) and apoptotic inducer staurosporine. Acute TBI biomarkers, GFAP and UCH-L1, were first detected and assessed in the culture media by Western blot. The cell-conditioned media were then trypsinized and subjected to bottom up proteomic analysis. GFAP was readily detected by data-dependent scanning but not UCH-L1. As a proof-of-principle study, rat glia-enriched cell cultures treated with MTX were used to investigate the time-dependent release of GFAP breakdown product by Western blot and for isotope dilution MS absolute quantitation method development. Absolute quantitation of the GFAP release was conducted using the three cortical mixed neuronal cell cultures treated with different agents. Other differentially expressed proteins identified in the glial-enriched and cortical mixed neuronal cell culture models were further analyzed by bioinformatic tools. In summary, this study demonstrates the use of MS in both protein identification and targeted quantitation of acute TBI biomarkers and is the preliminary step toward development of TBI biomarker validation by targeted MS.