Separation and characterisation of bovine histone H1 subtypes by combined ion-exchange and reversed-phase chromatography and mass spectrometry.

In order to separate and identify histone H1 subtypes from calf thymus we used both electrospray mass spectrometry (ES-MS) and matrix-assisted laser desorption ionisation time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS) after a three-step chromatographic procedure consisting of reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC), size-exclusion chromatography (SEC) and ion-exchange chromatography (IEC). Under the RP-HPLC conditions described, we obtained two baseline-separated H1-fractions which were characterised by MALDI-TOF-MS. The determined masses ranged from 22,850 to 22,590 for the first fraction and from 22,070 to 21,250 for the second fraction. Further, it was shown that the first fraction contained at least four and the second one at least five subtypes of the histone class H1. Four homogeneous pure H1 subtypes were obtained by a combination of IEC followed by SEC and RP-HPLC. The molecular masses of these four subtypes determined by ES-MS were 22,606, 22,761, 21,347 and 21,263. We obtained six additional molecular masses of histone H1 subtypes from three heterogeneous fractions, namely 22,066, 21,802, 20,586 and 19,817 by ES-MS and 22,800 and 22,675 by MALDI-TOF-MS. The retention times of these fractions and the molecular masses were in agreement with the data obtained from RP-HPLC fractions by MALDI-TOF-MS.