More than charged base loss--revisiting the fragmentation of highly charged oligonucleotides

Charge-State-Dependent Collision-Induced Dissociation Behaviors of RNA Oligonucleotides via High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry

Mass spectrometry (MS)-based analysis of RNA oligonucleotides (oligos) plays an increasingly important role in the development of RNA therapeutics and epitranscriptomics research. However, MS fragmentation behaviors of RNA oligomers are understood insufficiently. Herein, we characterized the negative-ion-mode fragmentation behaviors of 26 synthetic RNA oligos containing four to eight nucleotides using collision-induced dissociation (CID) on a high-resolution, accurate-mass instrument. We found that in CID spectra acquired under the normalized collision energy (NCE) of 35%, approximately 70% of the total peak intensity was attributed to sequencing ions (a-B, a, b, c, d, w, x, y, z), around 25% of the peak intensity came from precursor ions that experienced complete or partial loss of a nucleobase in the form of either a neutral or an anion, and the remainder were internal ions and anionic nucleobases. The top five sequencing ions were the y, c, w, a-B, and a ions. Furthermore, we observed that CID fragmentation behaviors of RNA oligos were significantly impacted by their precursor charge. Specifically, when the precursors had a charge from 1^- to 5^-, the fractional intensity of sequencing ions decreased, while that of precursors that underwent either neutral or charged losses of a nucleobase increased. Additionally, we found that RNA oligos containing 3'-U tended to produce precursors with HNCO and/or NCO^- losses, which presumably corresponded to isocyanic acid and cyanate anion, respectively. These findings provide valuable insights for better comprehending the mechanism behind RNA fragmentation by MS/MS, thereby facilitating the future automated identification of RNA oligos based on their CID spectra in a more efficient manner.

Mass spectrometry of modified RNAs: recent developments

A common feature of ribonucleic acids (RNAs) is that they can undergo a variety of chemical modifications. As nearly all of these chemical modifications result in an increase in the mass of the canonical nucleoside, mass spectrometry has long been a powerful approach for identifying and characterizing modified RNAs. Over the past several years, significant advances have been made in method development and software for interpreting tandem mass spectra resulting in approaches that can yield qualitative and quantitative information on RNA modifications, often at the level of sequence specificity. We discuss these advances along with instrumentation developments that have increased our ability to extract such information from relatively complex biological samples. With the increasing interest in how these modifications impact the epitranscriptome, mass spectrometry will continue to play an important role in bioanalytical investigations revolving around RNA.

DNA Oligonucleotide Fragment Ion Rearrangements Upon Collision-Induced Dissociation

Collision-induced dissociation (CID) of m/z-isolated w type fragment ions and an intact 5' phosphorylated DNA oligonucleotide generated rearranged product ions. Of the 21 studied w ions of various nucleotide sequences, fragment ion sizes, and charge states, 18 (~86%) generated rearranged product ions upon CID in a Synapt G2-S HDMS (Waters Corporation, Manchester, England, UK) ion mobility-mass spectrometer. Mass spectrometry (MS), ion mobility spectrometry (IMS), and theoretical modeling data suggest that purine bases can attack the free 5' phosphate group in w type ions and 5' phosphorylated DNA to generate sequence permuted [phosphopurine](-) fragment ions. We propose and discuss a potential mechanism for generation of rearranged [phosphopurine](-) and complementary y-B type product ions.