The primary structure of wheat glutenin subunit 1Dx2 revealed by electrospray ionization mass spectrometry

•We reveal the primary structure of HMW-GS 1Dx2 by proteomic analysis.•The molecular mass of subunit 1Dx2 was very accurately determined with HPLC–ESI-MS.•The MS mass value differed from the value derived from the NCBI database.•The mass difference was due to an additional proline in the amino acid sequence.

The high molecular weight glutenin subunits (HMW-GS) play a key role in end-use quality of wheat. Their particular primary structure is mostly derived from DNA sequencing, which gives no information on potential post-translational modifications. This paper reveals the primary structure of HMW-GS 1Dx2 by proteomic analysis. For this purpose, HMW-GS were first isolated from wheat flour (cv. Contra). The relative molecular mass (Mr) of subunit 1Dx2 present in the HMW-GS mixture was then very accurately determined with high-performance liquid chromatography–electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry using a quadrupole-time-of-flight mass analyzer (HPLC–ESI-QTOF-MS). The obtained Mr value (87,105) differed from the value derived from its protein sequence in the NCBI database (87,007). The subunit was further purified by preparative reversed-phase HPLC and partially hydrolyzed with chymotrypsin. The resulting 1Dx2 peptides were then analyzed by HPLC–ESI-MS/MS and the MS data were compared to amino acid sequences in protein databases. The discrepancy between the calculated and the measured Mr of 1Dx2 was explained by a missing proline in the 1Dx2 amino acid sequence from the database and not by any post-translational glycosylation.