PhosphoScan: a probability-based method for phosphorylation site prediction using MS2/MS3 pair information.

Phosphopeptide identification and phosphorylation site localization are crucial aspects of many biological studies. Furthermore, multiple phosphorylations of peptides make site localization even more difficult. We developed a probability-based method to unambiguously determine phosphorylation sites within phosphopeptides using MS2/3 pair information. A comparison test was performed with SEQUEST and MASCOT predictions using a spectral data set from a synthetic doubly phosphorylated peptide, and the results showed that PhosphoScan analysis yielded a 63% phosphopeptide localization improvement compared with SEQUEST and a 57% improvement compared with MASCOT.