Neuropeptides are important signaling molecules used by nervous systems to mediate and fine-tune neuronal communication. They can function as neurotransmitters or neuromodulators in neural circuits, or they can be released as neurohormones to target distant cells and tissues. Neuropeptides are typically cleaved from larger precursor proteins by the action of proteases and can be the subject of post-translational modifications. The short, mature neuropeptide sequences often entail the only evolutionarily reasonably conserved regions in these precursor proteins. Therefore, it is particularly challenging to predict all putative bioactive peptides through in silico mining of neuropeptide precursor sequences. Peptidomics is an approach that allows de novo characterization of peptides extracted from body fluids, cells, tissues, organs, or whole-body preparations. Mass spectrometry, often combined with on-line liquid chromatography, is a hallmark technique used in peptidomics research. Here, we used an acidified methanol extraction procedure and a quadrupole-Orbitrap LC-MS/MS pipeline to analyze the neuropeptidome of Caenorhabditis elegans. We identified an unprecedented number of 203 mature neuropeptides from C. elegans whole-body extracts, including 35 peptides from known, hypothetical, as well as from completely novel neuropeptide precursor proteins that have not been predicted in silico. This set of biochemically verified peptide sequences provides the most elaborate C. elegans reference neurpeptidome so far. To exploit this resource to the fullest, we make our in-house database of known and predicted neuropeptides available to the community as a valuable resource. We are providing these collective data to help the community progress, amongst others, by supporting future differential and/or functional studies.

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神经肽是神经系统用来介导和微调神经元沟通的重要信号分子。它们可以在神经回路中充当神经递质或神经调节剂，也可以作为神经激素释放到靶向远处的细胞和组织。通常通过蛋白酶的作用将神经肽从较大的前体蛋白上切割下来，并且可能成为翻译后修饰的对象。短而成熟的神经肽序列通常需要这些前体蛋白中仅有的进化上合理保守的区域。因此，通过计算机提取神经肽前体序列来预测所有推定的生物活性肽是特别具有挑战性的。肽组学是一种从头确定从体液，细胞，组织，器官，或全身制剂。质谱分析法通常与在线液相色谱法结合使用，是肽组学研究中使用的标志性技术。在这里，我们使用了一种酸化的甲醇提取程序和一个四极-Orbitrap LC-MS / MS管线来分析神经元的神经肽组。秀丽隐杆线虫。我们从秀丽隐杆线虫（C. elegans）全身提取物中鉴定出前所未有的203种成熟神经肽，包括35种来自已知假想肽以及从未在计算机模拟中预测的全新神经肽前体蛋白的肽。这套经过生物化学验证的肽序列提供了迄今为止最详尽的秀丽隐杆线虫参考神经肽组。为了最大程度地利用此资源，我们将内部已知和预测的神经肽的内部数据库作为有价值的资源提供给社区。我们正在提供这些集体数据，以通过支持未来的差异和/或功能研究来帮助社区进步。

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