A method for the determination and quantification of collagen types I –V in rat tissues
has been developed. This method is based on collagen fragmentation by cyanogen
bromide followed by trypsin digestion. After that, HPLC-MS/MS (HPLC coupled
to an IT mass spectrometer) analyses of the resulting peptide mixtures (peptide
maps) were performed. Specific peptides for each collagen type were selected.
According to online databases, these peptides are present in human, bovine, and rat
collagens. As a result, this method can be potentially applied to other species' tissues
as well, such as human tissues, and provides a universal and simple method of quantifying
collagen types. The applicability of this method for analyzing collagen types
was demonstrated on rat tissues (skin, tendon, and aorta).