Application of an Activity-Based Probe to Determine Proteolytic Activity of Cell Surface Cathepsin G by Mass Cytometry Data Acquisition

During an immune response, cathepsin G (CatG) takes on the role of adaptive and innate immunity and the outcome depends on the localization of CatG. Soluble, cell surface-bound, or intracellular CatG is also responsible for pathophysiology conditions. We applied the activity-based probe MARS116-Bt to mass cytometry by time-of-flight to analyze CatG activity on the cell surface of immune cells. The phosphonate warhead of MARS116-Bt binds covalently to the serine amino acid residue S195 of the catalytic center and thereby CatG activity can be detected. This method contributes to observing the activation or inhibition status of cells during pathogenesis of diseases and enables accurate data acquisition from complex biological samples with a vast panel of cell subset markers in a single-cell resolution.