文档介绍：Mass Spectrometry in the Analysis of Peptides
and Proteins, Past and Present
Peter Roepstorff
When the editor, John Chapman, asked me to write the introductory chapter
to this volume and told me that it would be dedicated to the late Michael
"Mickey'' Barber, I felt very honored and also humbled because I have always
considered Mlckey to be one of the most outstanding ploneers in the field of
mass spectrometry (MS) of proteins. Most younger scientists associate
Mickey's name with the invention of ionizat~onof pounds by
fast-atom bombardment (FAB) In 1981 (1). It is also true that this invention
had a major impact on the practical possibilities for mass spectrometric analy-
sls of peptides and proteins. However, only a few of the present generation of
scientists involved in MS of pept~desand protelns know that MS of peptides
was already an active field 30 years ago and also that Mickey's career in many
ways reflects the development in the field through all these years.
In the 1960s' a number of groups had realized and actively investigated the
potential of MS for peptlde analysis. The only ionizat~onmethod available was
electron impact (EI), which required volatile derivatives. Thls necessitated
extensive derivatization of the peptides prior to mass spectrometric analysis.
The following groups were pioneers in investigating MS: the group headed by
M. Shemyakin at the Institute for Chemistry of Natural Products of the USSR
Academy of Sciences, which worked with acylated and esterified peptides
(2); K. Biemann's group at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wh~chused
acylation followed by reduction of the peptides to amino alcohols followed by
trimethylsilylat~onand gas chromatography (GC)/MS (3); and E Lederer's
group at the Institute for Chemtstry of Natural Substances in Gif sur Yvette,
France, which studied natural peptidolipids among pounds. Mickey
Barber, who at that time worked at AEI in Manchester, got i