Re-mining serum proteomics data reveals extensive post-translational modifications upon Zika and dengue infection

Abstract

Zika virus (ZIKV) and dengue virus (DENV) are two closely related flaviviruses with similar symptoms; understanding differences in their molecular impact on the host is therefore of high interest. Viruses interact with the host's post-translational modifications, inducing changes visible in serum. As modifications are diverse and of low abundance, they typically require additional sample processing which is not feasible for large cohort studies. Therefore, we tested the potential of next-generation proteomics data in its ability to prioritize specific modifications for later targeted analysis. We re-mined published mass spectra from 122 unenriched serum samples from ZIKV and DENV patients for the presence of phosphorylated, methylated, oxidized, glycosylated/glycated, sulfated, and carboxylated peptides. We identified 272 modified peptides with significantly differential abundance in ZIKV and DENV patients. Amongst these, methionine-oxidized peptides from apolipoproteins and glycosylated peptides from immunoglobulin proteins were more abundant in ZIKV patient serum and generate hypotheses on the potential roles of the modification in the infection. The results demonstrate how data-independent acquisition techniques can help prioritize future analyses of peptide modifications.