Identification of Codon-Specific Serine to Asparagine Mistranslation in Recombinant Monoclonal Antibodies by High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

Translation errors in protein biosynthesis may result in low level amino acid misincorporation and contribute to product heterogeneity of recombinant protein therapeutics. We report the use of peptide map analysis by reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography and high-resolution mass spectrometry to detect and identify mistranslation events in recombinant monoclonal antibodies expressed in mammalian cell lines including Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells. Misincorporation of an asparagine residue at multiple serine positions was detected as earlier-eluting peptides with masses 27.01 Da higher than expected. The exact positions at which misincorporation occurred were identified by tandem mass spectrometry of the asparagine-containing variant peptides. The identified asparagine misincorporation sites correlated with the use of codon AGC but with none of the other five serine codons. The relative levels of misincorporation ranged from 0.01%-0.2% among multiple serine positions detected across three different antibodies by targeted analysis of expected and variant peptides. The low levels of misincorporation are consistent with published predictions for in vivo translation error rates. Our results demonstrate that state-of-the-art mass spectrometry with a combination of high sensitivity, accuracy, and dynamic range provides a new ability to discover and characterize low level protein variants that arise from mistranslation events.