peptide mass fingerprinting no relation archaeology
Ancient proteins are complex mixtures and the term palaeoproteomics is used to characterise the study of proteomes in the past. Ancients proteins have been recovered from a wide range of archaeological materials, including bones, teeth, eggshells, leathers, parchments, ceramics, painting binders and well-preserved soft tissues like gut intestines. These preserved proteins have provided valuable information about taxonomic identification, evolution history (phylogeny), diet, health, disease, technology and social dynamics in the past.
Like modern proteomics, the study of ancient proteins has also been enabled by technological advances. Various analytical techniques, for example, amino acid profiling, racemisation dating, immunodetection, Edman sequencing, peptide mass fingerprinting, and tandem mass spectrometry have been used to analyse ancient proteins. The introduction of high-performance mass spectrometry (for example, Orbitrap) in 2000 has revolutionised the field, since the entire preserved sequences of complex proteomes can be characterised.Over the past decade, the study of ancient proteins has evolved into a well-established field in archaeological science. However, like the research of aDNA (ancient DNA preserved in archaeological remains), it has been limited by several challenges such as the coverage of reference databases, identification, contamination and authentication. Researchers have been working on standardising sampling, extraction, data analysis and reporting for ancient proteins. Novel computational tools such as de novo sequencing and open research may also improve the identification of ancient proteomes.Other complex mixtures
Ceramics & food crusts. Various ancient dietary proteins have been characterised from ceramics and associated food crusts (charred and calcite deposits on ceramic vessels). Cow, sheep and goat milk beta-lactoglobulin proteins are predominant in this context, but there are also milk caseins (alpha-, beta- and kappa-casein), animal blood haemoglobins and a wide range of plant proteins (wheat glutenins, barley hordeins, legumins and other seed storage proteins). The identification of these ancient foodstuffs may be used to understand how food was prepared, cooked and consumed in the past. It is also clear that archaeological ceramics and food crusts are complex mixtures that contain metaproteomes (multiple proteomes).
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