Structural biology can offer valuable insights into the mechanisms and functions of key proteins within plant molecular and cellular systems. However, plant proteins present several specific challenges for structural analysis, including difficulties in expression and purification, significant intrinsic disorder, and extensive post-translational modification. Structural mass spectrometry (MS) offers a complementary set of tools that can help overcome these obstacles and provide detailed structural and mechanistic information. In this review, we outline the principles and practical applications of the main structural mass spectrometry techniques, namely crosslinking, covalent labelling, hydrogen-deuterium exchange, and both intact (denaturing) and native MS. We also discuss recent case studies where structural MS has offered insight into the architecture, dynamics and interactions of proteins central to plant molecular and cell biology.
Durant et al. (Sun,) studied this question.