Analyze Diet
Drug testing and analysis2023; doi: 10.1002/dta.3525

High-throughput untargeted screening of biotherapeutic macromolecules in equine plasma by UHPLC-HRMS/MS: Application to monoclonal antibodies and Fc-fusion proteins for doping control.

Abstract: Many innovative biotherapeutics have been marketed in the last decade. Monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and Fc-fusion proteins (Fc-proteins) have been developed for the treatment of diverse diseases (cancer, autoimmune diseases, and inflammatory disorders) and now represent an important part of targeted therapies. However, the ready availability of such biomolecules, sometimes characterized by their anabolic, anti-inflammatory, or erythropoiesis-stimulating properties, raises concerns about their potential misuse as performance enhancers for human and animal athletes. In equine doping control laboratories, a method has been reported to detect the administration of a specific human biotherapeutic in equine plasma; but no high-throughput method has been described for the screening without any a priori knowledge of human or murine biotherapeutic. In this context, a new broad-spectrum screening method involving UHPLC-HRMS/MS has been developed for the untargeted analysis of murine or human mAbs and related macromolecules in equine plasma. This approach, consisting of a "pellet digestion" strategy performed in a 96-well plate, demonstrates reliable performances at low concentrations (pmol/mL range) with high-throughput capability (≈100 samples/day). Targeting species-specific proteotypic peptides located within the constant parts of mAbs enables the "universal" detection of human biotherapeutics only by monitoring 10 peptides. As proof of principle, this strategy successfully detected different biotherapeutics in spiked plasma samples, and allowed, for the first time, the detection of a human mAb up to 10 days after a 0.12 mg/kg administration to a horse. This development will expand the analytical capabilities of horse doping control laboratories towards protein-based biotherapeutics with adequate sensitivity, throughput, and cost-effectiveness.
Publication Date: 2023-06-20 PubMed ID: 37337992DOI: 10.1002/dta.3525Google Scholar: Lookup
The Equine Research Bank provides access to a large database of publicly available scientific literature. Inclusion in the Research Bank does not imply endorsement of study methods or findings by Mad Barn.
  • Journal Article

Summary

This research summary has been generated with artificial intelligence and may contain errors and omissions. Refer to the original study to confirm details provided. Submit correction.

This research study presents a screening method for detecting the misuse of certain biotherapeutic proteins in horse racing. The method is based on ultra-high performance liquid chromatography and high-resolution mass spectrometry, and can be effective in controlling doping by providing broad-spectrum screening of human or murine proteins in equine plasma.

Research Objectives and Motivation

  • The main objective of this research was to develop a high-throughput, untargeted screening method to detect the presence of biotherapeutic macromolecules – specifically, monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and Fc-fusion proteins – in equine plasma.
  • This development was motivated by the concern that such biotherapeutic proteins, which have been developed for human medical treatment purposes, might be misused as performance enhancers in horse racing.

Methodology

  • The proposed screening method uses Ultra High Performance Liquid Chromatography coupled with High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry/Mass Spectrometry (UHPLC-HRMS/MS).
  • A “pellet digestion” strategy is employed, enabling high-throughput screening capability of approximately 100 samples per day.
  • The unique feature of this method is that it can detect mAbs and related macromolecules without any prior knowledge of their presence.

Findings

  • This screening method demonstrated reliable performance at low concentrations, specifically in the picomolar per milliliter range.
  • It was found that it could universally detect human biotherapeutics by monitoring just 10 peptides located within the constant parts of mAbs.
  • In practical tests, this strategy successfully detected various biotherapeutics in spiked plasma samples, and even managed to detect a human mAb up to 10 days after administration to a horse, marking a first in this field of research.

Impact and Utility

  • This development enhances the analytical capabilities of horse doping control laboratories, enabling them to detect and monitor protein-based biotherapeutics with adequate sensitivity and cost-effectiveness.
  • As such, it can contribute significantly to the fight against doping in horse racing and other equestrian sports, helping to ensure fair competition and animal welfare.

Cite This Article

APA
Pinetre J, Delcourt V, Becher F, Garcia P, Barnabé A, Loup B, Popot MA, Fenaille F, Bailly-Chouriberry L. (2023). High-throughput untargeted screening of biotherapeutic macromolecules in equine plasma by UHPLC-HRMS/MS: Application to monoclonal antibodies and Fc-fusion proteins for doping control. Drug Test Anal. https://doi.org/10.1002/dta.3525

Publication

ISSN: 1942-7611
NlmUniqueID: 101483449
Country: England
Language: English

Researcher Affiliations

Pinetre, Justine
  • GIE LCH, Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, Verrières-le-Buisson, Essonne, France.
  • Université Paris-Saclay, CEA, INRAE, Département Médicaments et Technologies pour la Santé (DMTS), MetaboHUB, Gif sur Yvette, Ile de France, France.
Delcourt, Vivian
  • GIE LCH, Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, Verrières-le-Buisson, Essonne, France.
Becher, François
  • Université Paris-Saclay, CEA, INRAE, Département Médicaments et Technologies pour la Santé (DMTS), MetaboHUB, Gif sur Yvette, Ile de France, France.
Garcia, Patrice
  • GIE LCH, Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, Verrières-le-Buisson, Essonne, France.
Barnabé, Agnès
  • GIE LCH, Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, Verrières-le-Buisson, Essonne, France.
Loup, Benoit
  • GIE LCH, Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, Verrières-le-Buisson, Essonne, France.
Popot, Marie-Agnès
  • GIE LCH, Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, Verrières-le-Buisson, Essonne, France.
Fenaille, François
  • Université Paris-Saclay, CEA, INRAE, Département Médicaments et Technologies pour la Santé (DMTS), MetaboHUB, Gif sur Yvette, Ile de France, France.
Bailly-Chouriberry, Ludovic
  • GIE LCH, Laboratoire des Courses Hippiques, Verrières-le-Buisson, Essonne, France.

Grant Funding

  • Association Nationale de la Recherche et de la Technologie
  • Institut Franu00e7ais du Cheval et de l'Equitation

References

This article includes 40 references
  1. Nelson AL, Dhimolea E, Reichert JM. Development trends for human monoclonal antibody therapeutics.. Nat Rev Drug Discov 2010;9(10):767-774.
    doi: 10.1038/nrd3229google scholar: lookup
  2. Goswami S, Wang W, Arakawa T, Ohtake S. Developments and challenges for mAb-based therapeutics.. Antibodies 2013;2(4):452-500.
    doi: 10.3390/antib2030452google scholar: lookup
  3. Singh S, Kumar NK, Dwiwedi P. Monoclonal antibodies: a review.. CCP 2018;13(2):85-99.
  4. Walsh G, Walsh E. Biopharmaceutical benchmarks 2022.. Nat Biotechnol 2022;40(12):1722-1760.
  5. Grilo AL, Mantalaris A. The increasingly human and profitable monoclonal antibody market.. Trends Biotechnol 2019;37(1):9-16.
  6. Knight DM, Trinh H, Le J. Construction and initial characterization of a mouse-human chimeric anti-TNF antibody.. Mol Immunol 1993;30(16):1443-1453.
  7. Furst DE, Schiff MH, Fleischmann RM. Adalimumab, a fully human anti-tumor necrosis factor-α monoclonal antibody, and concomitant standard Antirheumatic therapy for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis: results of STAR (safety trial of adalimumab in rheumatoid arthritis).. J Rheumatol 2003;30:2563-2571.
  8. Lach-Trifilieff E, Minetti GC, Sheppard K. An antibody blocking Activin type II receptors induces strong skeletal muscle hypertrophy and protects from atrophy.. Mol Cell Biol 2014;34(4):606-618.
    doi: 10.1128/mcb.01307-13google scholar: lookup
  9. FEI Clean Sport Prohibited Substances Database: Accessed May, 2023 http://prohibitedsubstancesdatabase.feicleansport.org/
  10. International Agreement on Breeding, Racing, and Wagering: Accessed May, 2023 https://www.ifhaonline.org/resources/ifAgreement.pdf
  11. World Anti-doping Code Prohibited list 2022: Accessed May, 2023 https://www.wada-ama.org/sites/default/files/resources/files/2022list_final_en.pdf
  12. Puszkiel A, Noé G, Boudou-Rouquette P. Development and validation of an ELISA method for the quantification of nivolumab in plasma from non-small-cell lung cancer patients.. J Pharm Biomed Anal 2017;139:30-36.
  13. Basak EA, Wijkhuijs AJM, Mathijssen RHJ, Koolen SLW, Schreurs MWJ. Development of an enzyme-linked immune sorbent assay to measure Nivolumab and Pembrolizumab serum concentrations.. Ther Drug Monit 2018;40(5):596-601.
  14. Pluim D, Ros W, van Bussel MTJ, Brandsma D, Beijnen JH, Schellens JHM. Enzyme linked immunosorbent assay for the quantification of nivolumab and pembrolizumab in human serum and cerebrospinal fluid.. J Pharm Biomed Anal 2019;164:128-134.
  15. Iwamoto N, Takanashi M, Shimada T, Sasaki J, Hamada A. Comparison of bevacizumab quantification results in plasma of non-small cell lung cancer patients using bioanalytical techniques between LC-MS/MS, ELISA, and microfluidic-based immunoassay.. AAPS j 2019;21(6):101.
    doi: 10.1208/s12248-019-0369-zgoogle scholar: lookup
  16. Becher F, Ciccolini J, Imbs D-C. A simple and rapid LC-MS/MS method for therapeutic drug monitoring of cetuximab: a GPCO-UNICANCER proof of concept study in head-and-neck cancer patients.. Sci Rep 2017;7(1):2714.
  17. Gong C, Zheng N, Zeng J, Aubry A-F, Arnold ME. Post-pellet-digestion precipitation and solid phase extraction: a practical and efficient workflow to extract surrogate peptides for ultra-high performance liquid chromatography - tandem mass spectrometry bioanalysis of a therapeutic antibody in the low ng/mL range.. J Chromatogr a 2015;1424:27-36.
  18. Delcourt V, Garcia P, Chabot B. Screening and confirmatory analysis of recombinant human erythropoietin for racing camels' doping control.. Drug Test Anal 2020;12(6):763-770.
    doi: 10.1002/dta.2772google scholar: lookup
  19. Chiu H-H, Tsai Y-J, Lo C, Lin C-H, Tsai I-L, Kuo C-H. Development of an efficient mAb quantification assay by LC-MS/MS using rapid on-bead digestion.. Anal Chim Acta 2022;1193:339319.
    doi: 10.1016/j.aca.2021.339319google scholar: lookup
  20. Bondarenko PV, Second TP, Zabrouskov V, Makarov AA, Zhang Z. Mass measurement and top-down HPLC/MS analysis of intact monoclonal antibodies on a hybrid linear quadrupole ion trap-orbitrap mass spectrometer.. J am Soc Mass Spectrom 2009;20(8):1415-1424.
  21. Wei C, Su D, Wang J, Jian W, Zhang D. LC-MS challenges in characterizing and quantifying monoclonal antibodies (mAb) and antibody-drug conjugates (ADC) in biological samples.. Curr Pharmacol Rep 2018;4(1):45-63.
    doi: 10.1007/s40495-017-0118-xgoogle scholar: lookup
  22. Ouyang Z, Furlong MT, Wu S. Pellet digestion: a simple and efficient sample preparation technique for LC-MS/MS quantification of large therapeutic proteins in plasma.. Bioanalysis 2012;4(1):17-28.
    doi: 10.4155/bio.11.286google scholar: lookup
  23. Willeman T, Jourdil J-F, Gautier-Veyret E, Bonaz B, Stanke-Labesque F. A multiplex liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry method for the quantification of seven therapeutic monoclonal antibodies: application for adalimumab therapeutic drug monitoring in patients with Crohn's disease.. Anal Chim Acta 2019;1067:63-70.
    doi: 10.1016/j.aca.2019.03.033google scholar: lookup
  24. Iwamoto N, Yokoyama K, Takanashi M, Yonezawa A, Matsubara K, Shimada T. Verification between original and biosimilar therapeutic antibody infliximab using nSMOL coupled LC-MS bioanalysis in human serum.. CPB 2018;19(6):495-505.
  25. Walpurgis K, Thomas A, Thevis M. Detection of the myostatin-neutralizing antibody domagrozumab in serum by means of western blotting and LC-HRMS.. Drug Test Anal 2019;11(6):1714-1723.
    doi: 10.1002/dta.2729google scholar: lookup
  26. Walpurgis K, Thomas A, Dellanna F, Schänzer W, Thevis M. Detection of the human anti-actRII antibody bimagrumab in serum by means of affinity purification, tryptic digestion, and LC-HRMS.. Prot Clin Appl 2018;12:1714.
    doi: 10.1002/prca.201700120google scholar: lookup
  27. Walpurgis K, Thomas A, Lange T, Reichel C, Geyer H, Thevis M. Combined detection of the ActRII-Fc fusion proteins sotatercept (ActRIIA-Fc) and luspatercept (modified ActRIIB-Fc) in serum by means of immunoaffinity purification, tryptic digestion, and LC-MS/MS.. Drug Test Anal 2018;10(11-12):1714-1721.
    doi: 10.1002/dta.2513google scholar: lookup
  28. Walpurgis K, Weigand T, Knoop A. Detection of follistatin-based inhibitors of the TGF-β signaling pathways in serum/plasma by means of LC-HRMS/MS and western blotting.. Drug Test Anal 2020;12:1636-1648.
    doi: 10.1002/dta.2925google scholar: lookup
  29. Guan F, Robinson MA, Soma LR. Confirmatory analysis of etanercept in equine plasma by LC-MS for doping control: confirmatory analysis of etanercept in equine plasma by LC-MS.. Drug Test Anal 2017;9(9):1421-1431.
    doi: 10.1002/dta.2091google scholar: lookup
  30. https://www.aorc-online.org/documents/aorc-ms-criteria-modified-23-aug-16/, Accessed may, 2023
  31. Animals in scientific research - Environment - European Commission Accessed May, 2023 https://ec.europa.eu/environment/chemicals/lab_animals/index_en.htm
  32. Sayers EW, Beck J, Bolton EE. Database resources of the National Center for biotechnology information.. Nucleic Acids Res 2021;49(D1):D10-D17.
    doi: 10.1093/nar/gkaa892google scholar: lookup
  33. The UniProt Consortium. UniProt: the universal protein knowledgebase in 2021.. Nucleic Acids Res 2021;49(D1):D480-D489.
    doi: 10.1093/nar/gkaa1100google scholar: lookup
  34. Kanehisa M, Furumichi M, Tanabe M, Sato Y, Morishima K. KEGG: new perspectives on genomes, pathways, diseases and drugs.. Nucleic Acids Res 2017;45(D1):D353-D361.
    doi: 10.1093/nar/gkw1092google scholar: lookup
  35. Wishart DS. DrugBank: a comprehensive resource for in silico drug discovery and exploration.. Nucleic Acids Res 2006;34(90001):D668-D672.
    doi: 10.1093/nar/gkj067google scholar: lookup
  36. Dunbar J, Krawczyk K, Leem J. SAbDab: the structural antibody database.. Nucl Acids Res 2014;42(D1):D1140-D1146.
    doi: 10.1093/nar/gkt1043google scholar: lookup
  37. Sievers F, Wilm A, Dineen D. Fast, scalable generation of high-quality protein multiple sequence alignments using Clustal omega.. Mol Syst Biol 2011;7(1):539.
    doi: 10.1038/msb.2011.75google scholar: lookup
  38. MacLean B, Tomazela DM, Shulman N. Skyline: an open source document editor for creating and analyzing targeted proteomics experiments.. Bioinformatics 2010;26(7):966-968.
  39. Yuan L, Arnold ME, Aubry A-F, Ji QC. Simple and efficient digestion of a monoclonal antibody in serum using pellet digestion: comparison with traditional digestion methods in LC-MS/MS bioanalysis.. Bioanalysis 2012;4(24):2887-2896.
    doi: 10.4155/bio.12.284google scholar: lookup
  40. Breci LA, Tabb DL, Yates JR, Wysocki VH. Cleavage N-terminal to proline: analysis of a database of peptide tandem mass spectra.. Anal Chem 2003;75(9):1963-1971.
    doi: 10.1021/ac026359igoogle scholar: lookup

Citations

This article has been cited 0 times.