Two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2-DE) has been widely used for proteomic analysis (Herosimczyk et al., 2006; Desrosiers et al., 2007). However, this method has limitations in effectively identifying proteins of low abundance and its dynamic range is limited. Gel-free methodologies have gained attention in recent years since they allow for the determination and quantification of a wider range of proteins (Marcus et al., 2020). The need for detecting novel prognostic biomarkers to predict disease outcomes has led proteomic research in canine medicine to focus on infectious diseases, with leishmaniosis being the most prominent example (Agallou et al., 2016; Escribano et al., 2016b; Martinez-Subiela et al., 2017b; Franco-Martínez et al., 2019), followed by diseases like babesiosis (Adaszek et al., 2014b; Galán et al., 2018; Winiarczyk et al., 2019), dirofilariasis (Hormaeche et al., 2014), ehrlichiosis (Escribano et al., 2017), and parvovirus infection (Franco-Martínez et al., 2018). Some studies on patients with leishmaniosis and babesiosis found a significant downregulation of Apolipoprotein A, which may reduce the individual's capacity to respond to oxidative damage. Beyond the field of infectious diseases, proteomic analysis has provided new insights in veterinary nephrology, revealing that an increase in proteins like retinol-binding protein predicts kidney damage before azotemia develops (Nabity et al., 2011; Chacar et al., 2017; Ferlizza et al., 2020), and in veterinary endocrinology, uncovering the role of Apolipoprotein I in canine obesity (Tvarijonaviciute et al., 2012; Lucena et al., 2019). According to the literature, the most commonly analyzed samples in small animal medicine are serum and saliva (González-Arostegui et al., 2022). Studies have also been conducted with other biological fluids such as cerebrospinal fluid, bile, liver, synovial fluid, myocardium (Yuan et al., 2006; Kjelgaard-Hansen et al., 2007; Plumb et al., 2009; Nakamura et al., 2012; Lawrence et al., 2018), and feces (Cerquetella et al., 2019). Currently, there is no systematic catalog of dog plasma proteins available. However, a catalog is available for human plasma that can be used for comparison, such as PeptideAtlas, which contains 3509 proteins (Schwenk et al., 2017). Although proteomic analysis of canine plasma is less performed than serum analysis, some studies on canine plasma have been reported, with the plasma proteins detected in dogs with SIRS and MODS being 68, 12 in obese dogs with and without obesity-related metabolic dysfunction, and finally 87 in dogs diagnosed with canine cognitive dysfunction syndrome respectively. (Kuleš et al., 2016; Tvarijonaviciute et al., 2016; Phochantachinda et al., 2021).
In our study, we utilized a label-free quantification LC-MS method to analyze canine plasma. The plasma of 30 healthy individuals was used. The median age of the 30 dogs was 5,7 years old (range 1,3-9,9 years old), median weight was 18,4 kg (range 5-37,5 kg), while 15 dogs were male (50%) and 15 dogs were female (50%). Sixteen (60%) dogs were castrated and 14 (40%) were intact. All included dogs had an ideal body condition score of 5/9. Of these dogs, 9 were mix breeds, 3 Australian Shepherds, 2 Golden Retrievers, 2 German Shepherds, 2 Puli’s and 12 other breeds were represented by 1 dog each. These samples were randomly selected, according to the inclusion criteria, to avoid preserve heterogenicity and were thereafter grouped into five pools of six individuals using a computer script, as outlined in the material and methods section. We assessed the plasma protein content and evaluated two depletion methods for high-abundance proteins. The first method involved the use of a commercial kit designed for depleting the 14 most abundant human plasma proteins (referred to as "kit"), while the second method employed a low-cost in-house approach using Blue-Sepharose. The purpose of the Blue-Sepharose method was specifically to remove albumin (referred to as "Blue-Sepharose"). To optimize the process, we incorporated a set of clinical samples obtained from healthy individuals with well-established normal profiles of routine blood parameters.
All raw data and result files from our MS experiments have been made available in the public repository ProteomeXchange, as outlined in the materials and methods section. Initially, we identified a total of 282 proteins. Subsequently, proteins that were not identified in in at least 3 out of 5 replicates from at least one of the three groups from at least one of the three groups (Control, Kit, Blue-Sepharose) removed. This filtering process resulted in the quantification of 181 proteins in the plasma samples. Figure 1 illustrates the above-mentioned data processing steps. For protein description, gene IDs were primarily used. In cases where gene names were unavailable, protein IDs were utilized instead. Among all the samples, some of the most abundant proteins identified were apolipoprotein A and B (APOA, APOB), albumin (ALB), alpha-2-macroglobulin (A2M), fibrinogen beta chain (FGB), fibronectin (FN1), complement C3 (C3), serotransferrin (LOC477072), coagulation Factor V (F5), maltase-glucoamylase (MGAM), and several uncharacterized proteins (LOC611458, LOC481722, A0A8I3P3U9). For a detailed list of all identified proteins and the raw data, please refer to the Supplementary Material (Supplementary Table S1).
Prior to excluding proteins that were not detected in at least three replicates from any of the three groups, 163 out of the 181 proteins were present in all three groups, while 15 proteins were only present in the Control and Kit groups, 5 proteins to the Control and Blue-Sepharose groups, and 5 proteins to the Kit and Blue-Sepharose groups. Additionally, one protein (S100A12) was exclusively identified in the kit depletion experiment, two proteins (Ig-like domain-containing proteins, Protein IDs: A0A8I3P3T7 and A0A8I3P941) were exclusively identified in the Blue-Sepharose depletion experiment, and one protein (AMBP) was exclusively identified in the experiment without depletion (control).
The ranking of protein abundance can be observed in Figure 2. Principal component analysis demonstrated significant and clear segregation among the three methods (Supplementary Figure 2). The pairwise hierarchical clustering and correlation analysis of all protein samples using the two different depletion methods, as well as the total proteins detected without depletion as control, are depicted in Figure 3.
Significant depletion of high-abundance proteins, particularly albumin, was not achieved with either technique (Kit, Blue-Sepharose) compared to the control technique without depletion (Supplementary Figure S1). However, the log2 fold-change of albumin concentration in samples after using the kit and the Blue-Sepharose depletion was small (0.312) but statistically significant (q value = 0.007), with albumin being more abundant after depletion with Blue-Sepharose. One possible explanation for the inadequate depletion of high-abundance canine plasma proteins with the commercial kit is that the kit used in this study is designed for depleting high-abundance proteins in human plasma or serum and has not been validated for depleting proteins from canine plasma. These antibodies are not entirely specific and have affinity for several other proteins (Bellei et al., 2011). Furthermore, the Blue-Sepharose depletion method used in this experiment is not yet standardized for animal samples, and we hypothesize that variations in the protocol, such as the amount of sample or Blue-Sepharose added, might contribute to better depletion results.
In this study, we used canine plasma instead of serum as we aimed to identify proteins involved in the coagulation cascade. Fibrinogen A (FGA) showed a significant decrease in abundance (log2 fold-change -1.469, q-value = 0.006) after depletion with the kit compared to the control group. However, it is still unclear to what extent fibrinogen affects depletion and how it interferes with the detection of lower abundance proteins.
The two different depletion methods exhibit significant differences in the fold change of numerous proteins compared to the three different techniques (Figure 4A, 5B, 5C). Thirty-two proteins were differentially abundant among the control and kit depletion methods, with 27 being more abundant with the control method and 5 with the kit depletion method (Supplementary Table S2). Among the most important proteins that showed a significant increase after kit depletion compared to the control method are interleukin 1 receptor accessory protein (IL1RAP), solute carrier family 12 member 4 (LCAT), insulin-like growth factor binding protein acid labile subunit (IGFALS), sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG), and V-type proton ATPase subunit G (A0A8I3PF02). On the other hand, hemoglobin subunit alpha (HBA), ferritin (LOC119868428), complement C1q C (CIQC), fibrinogen alpha chain (FGA), and Ig-like domain-containing protein (A0A8I3PB96) were significantly more abundant in the control experiment without depletion (Supplementary Figure S5 A). Fifty-three proteins were differentially abundant among the control and Blue Sepharose depletion methods, with 35 being more abundant with the control method and 18 with the Blue Sepharose depletion method (Supplementary Table S3). Interestingly, IL1RAP and SHBG exhibited a significantly increased relative intensity after depletion with the Blue-Sepharose method compared to the control group (Supplementary Figure S5 B). Finally, we directly compared the proteins detected with the two different depletion techniques (Supplementary Figure S5 C). Eighty-two proteins were differentially abundant among the Blue Sepharose and kit depletion methods, with 45 being more abundant with the Blue Sepharose method and 37 with the kit depletion method (Supplementary Table S4). The most noteworthy proteins that were significantly more abundant after kit depletion include complement C5 (C5), coagulation Factor V (F5), apolipoprotein E (APOE), fibronectin (FN1), and serpin family F member (SERPINF1), while HBA, Ig-like domain-containing protein (A0A8I3QPN8), ferritin (LOC119868428), C-type lectin domain-containing protein (MBL1), and immunoglobulin heavy constant mu (IGHM) were found in significantly higher concentrations using the Blue-Sepharose method.
In our experimental conditions, we did not find a clear benefit of using depletion methods because one of the goals of using these methods was to increase the number of detected proteins, which was not achieved in our study. There is a possibility that the kit for protein depletion is not well optimized for dog plasma. This seems to be the case for Blue-Sepharose as well, as albumin did not significantly decrease and other unexpected proteins were decreased, likely due to nonspecific binding. For this reason, with the present instrumental setup described here, we consider that it is not necessary, in principle, to use a depletion method for canine plasma analysis, or alternatively, a new specific depletion method should be developed and tested. In the case of Blue-Sepharose, the diminishing abundance of certain proteins, but not albumin, may indicate nonspecific and unpredictable binding of these protein sets. In contrast, albumin unexpectedly did not decrease in concentration.