Purification and identification of endogenous antioxidant and ACE-inhibitory peptides from donkey milk by multidimensional liquid chromatography and nanoHPLC-high resolution mass spectrometry

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

  • Riccardo Zenezini Chiozzi
  • Anna Laura Capriotti
  • Chiara Cavaliere
  • La Barbera, Giorgia
  • Susy Piovesana
  • Roberto Samperi
  • Aldo Laganà

Donkey milk is a valuable product for the food industry due to its nutraceutical, nutritional, and functional properties. In this work, the endogenous peptides from donkey milk were investigated for their antioxidant and ACE-inhibitory activities, combining a two-dimensional peptide fractionation strategy with high-resolution mass spectrometry, bioinformatics analysis, and in vitro assays. After extraction, the endogenous peptides were fractionated twice, first by polymeric reversed phase and then by hydrophilic interaction chromatography. Fractions were screened for the investigated bioactivities and only the most active ones were finally analyzed by nanoRP-HPLC-MS/MS; this approach allowed to reduce the total number of possible bioactive sequences. Results were further mined by in silico analysis using PeptideRanker, BioPep, and PepBank, which provided a bioactivity score to the identified peptides and matched sequences to known bioactive peptides, in order to select candidates for chemical synthesis. Thus, five peptides were prepared and then compared to the natural occurring ones, checking their retention times and fragmentation patterns in donkey milk alone and in spiked donkey milk samples. Pure peptide standards were finally in vitro tested for the specific bioactivity. In this way, two novel endogenous antioxidant peptides, namely EWFTFLKEAGQGAKDMWR and GQGAKDMWR, and two ACE-inhibitory peptides, namely REWFTFLK and MPFLKSPIVPF, were successfully validated from donkey milk. [Figure not available: see fulltext.]

Original languageEnglish
JournalAnalytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry
Volume408
Issue number20
Pages (from-to)5657-5666
Number of pages10
ISSN1618-2642
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2016
Externally publishedYes

    Research areas

  • ACE-inhibitory peptides, Antioxidant peptides, Donkey milk, High-resolution mass spectrometry, Off-line two-dimensional chromatography, Peptidomics

ID: 231311536