On-line high-performance liquid chromatography/mass spectrometric investigation of amyloid-beta peptide variants found in Alzheimer's disease

A beta peptides are the major components of amyloid deposits in Alzheimer's disease. The presence of N-terminally truncated A beta variants in amyloid may be a critical factor in Alzheimer's disease pathogenesis, These A beta variants are less soluble and more amyloidogenic than full-length A beta, making their separation, purification and identification difficult, High-pe rformance liquid chromatography (HPLC) at elevated temperatures, coupled to electrospray ionization (ES) mass spectrometry (MS), enables rapid separat ion and identification of N-terminally truncated A beta variants. This meth odology provides a potential tool for exploring the importance of these A b eta variants in both the pathogenesis and diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.