Methodology to fish peptide ligands of nAChRs from Cone snail venoms by MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry

More than 50,000 of venomous species are currently indexed in the world. Each of their venom is composed of hundreds of toxins which potentially exhibit a high selectivity for membrane receptors such as GPCRs or ion channels. Among them, nAChRs are a target for drug discovery, primarily for treating central nervous system troubles. Therefore, the discovery of pharmacological tools and innovative drugs targeting nAChRs from animal venoms appears as an evidence.
This study proposes the use a mass-spectrometry based methodology1 to discover new nAChRs ligands from cone snails venoms, and particularly -conotoxins (a-CTXs), known as potential antagonists of nAChRs2. in few words, Torpedo membranes, containing a high concentration of nAChRs, are incubated with BSA tryptic digests (>100 peptides) doped by small amounts of known a-CTXs. After two hours incubation, free (i.e. containing molecules remaining in solution) and bound (i.e. peptides bound to the membranes) fractions were analyzed with a MALDI-TOF/TOF mass spectrometer. The POC (positive and negative controls) as well as a real screening of Conus ermineus venom are presented.