Rapid Separation and Display of Active Fibrinogenolytic Agents in Sipunculus nudus through Fibrinogen-Polyacrylamide Gel Electrophoresis
Summary
Here, we present a fibrinogen-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE) protocol to rapidly separate and display the fibrinogenolytic agents of Sipunculus nudus.
Abstract
Fibrinogenolytic agents that can dissolve fibrinogen directly have been widely used in anti-coagulation treatment. Generally, identifying new fibrinogenolytic agents requires the separation of each component first and then checking their fibrinogenolytic activities. Currently, polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE) and chromatography are mostly used in the separating stage. Meanwhile, the fibrinogen plate assay and reaction products based PAGE are usually adopted to display their fibrinogenolytic activities. However, because of the spatiotemporal separation of those two stages, it is impossible to separate and display the active fibrinogenolytic agents with the same gel. To simplify the separating and displaying processes of fibrinogenolytic agent identification, we constructed a new fibrinogen-PAGE method to rapidly separate and display the fibrinogenolytic agents of peanut worms (Sipunculus nudus) in this study. This method includes fibrinogen-PAGE preparation, electrophoresis, renaturation, incubation, staining, and decolorization. The fibrinogenolytic activity and molecular weight of the protein can be detected simultaneously. According to this method, we successfully detected more than one active fibrinogenolytic agent of peanut wormhomogenate within 6 h. Moreover, this fibrinogen-PAGE method is time and cost-friendly. Furthermore, this method could be used to study the fibrinogenolytic agents of the other organisms.
Introduction
In recent years, due to the continued rise of thrombotic diseases, thrombotic diseases have become a new major global health problem1. At present, antithrombotic drugs are classified into three groups: anti-platelet aggregation drugs, anticoagulants, and thrombolytic drugs. Among them, thrombolytic drugs, such as urokinase (UK), tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), etc., are the only clinically used drugs that can hydrolyze thrombus2. Meanwhile, more safe and effective thrombolytic drugs are being developed by the identification of novel thrombolytic agents3.
However, the identification of novel thrombolytic agents is time-consuming and labor-intensive, which mainly involves the separation/purification and characterization/checking stages. The former is to separate each component, and the latter is to display their fibrino(geno)lytic activities4,5. In previous studies, despite the fact we have successfully isolated a novel fibrino(geno)lytic enzyme (sFE) from the peanut worm (Sipunculus nudus) by affinity chromatography and fibrin(ogen) plate assay6,7,8, these processes are such time and labor-consuming. First, it is necessary to determine whether the peanut worm homogenates have fibrino(geno)lytic activity by the fibrin(ogen) plate method and reaction products based on PAGE9. Then, a series of chromatography, such as ion exchange chromatography, gel filtration chromatography, affinity chromatography, and other methods, have to be carried out for separation and purification10,11. Subsequently, the fibrin plate assay is performed again to check the fibrinogenolytic activity of each separated component. Finally, native-PAGE and sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS)-PAGE are performed to determine the molecular weight of the active fibrinogenolytic agents12. Therefore, it is critical to rapidly separate and display the active fibrinogenolytic agents.
To rapidly separate and display the active fibrinogenolytic agents in the peanut worm homogenates, a new fibrinogen-PAGE method was developed by combining the PAGE and fibrinogen plate methods, i.e., the substrates of fibrinogenolytic agents fibrinogen were added to the native-PAGE gel. After native-PAGE, the components were separated by their molecular weight. Meanwhile, each active fibrinogenolytic component can be displayed by staining. By this method, we successfully detected more than one active fibrinogenolytic agent of peanut worm homogenate within 6 h. Moreover, this fibrinogen-PAGE method is time and cost-friendly. Furthermore, this method could be used to study the fibrinogenolytic agents of the other organisms.
Protocol
Representative Results
Discussion
sFE is a novel fibrino(geno)lytic enzyme isolated from peanut worms by our team previously3,6,8,13. However, the identification processes of sFE were time- and labor-consuming, involving the fibrinogenolytic activity detection, protein components separation, and activity confirmation stages. As a simple method, fibrinogen plate assay is mostly used in the preliminary screening stage to check th…
Divulgations
The authors have nothing to disclose.
Acknowledgements
This research was funded by the Science and Technology Bureau of Xiamen City (No. 3502Z20227197), the Science and Technology Bureau of Fujian Province (No. 2019J01070; No. 2022J01311), and High-level Talents Innovation and Entrepreneurship Project of Quanzhou Science and Technology Plan (No. 2022C015R). We thank Fucai Wang (Huaqiao University) and Lei Tong (Huaqiao University) for their technical assistance.
Materials
| 1 M Tris-HCl (pH 6.8) | Solarbio | T1020 | |
| 1.5 M Tris-HCl (pH 8.8) | Solarbio | T1010 | |
| 30% Acrylamide/Bis-acrylamide | Biosharp | BL513B | |
| Ammonium persulfate | XiLONG SCIENTIFIC | 7727-54-0 | |
| Beaker | PYREX | 2-9425-02 | |
| Centrifuge Tube (1.5 mL) | Biosharp | BS-15-M | |
| Constant Temperature Incubator | JINGHONG | JHS-400 | |
| Coomas Brillant Blue Stainning solution | Beyotime | P0017F | |
| Electronic Analytical Balance | DENVER | TP-213 | |
| Fibrinogen | Solarbio | F8051 | |
| Gel loading pipette tips, Bulk | Biosharp | BS-200-GTB | |
| Homogenizer | AHS | ATS-1500 | |
| Horizontal rotation oscillator | NuoMi | NMSP-600 | |
| Milli-Q Reference | Millipore | Z00QSV0CN | |
| Mini-PROTEAN Tetra Cell | BIO-RAD | 165-8000~165-8007 | |
| N,N,N',N'-Tetramethylethylenediamine | Sigma | T9281 | |
| Pipette Tip (1 mL) | Axygene | T-1000XT-C | |
| Pipette Tip (10 µL) | Axygene | T-10XT-C | |
| Pipette Tip (200 µL) | Axygene | T-200XT-C | |
| Pipettor (1 mL) | Thermo Fisher Scientific | ZY18723 | |
| Pipettor (10µL) | Thermo Fisher Scientific | ZX98775 | |
| Pipettor (200 µL) | Thermo Fisher Scientific | ZY20280 | |
| Pipettor (50 µL) | Thermo Fisher Scientific | ZY15331 | |
| Refrigerated Centrifuge | cence | H1650R | |
| Sodium dodecyl sulfate | Sigma-Aldrich | V900859 | |
| Tris | Solarbio | T8060 | |
| Tris-HCl | Solarbio | T8230 | |
| Triton X-100 | Solarbio | T8200 |
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