Protein sequencing is that the practical process of determining the aminoalkanoic acid sequence of all or a part of a protein or peptide. this might serve to spot the protein or characterize its post-translational modifications. Typically, partial sequencing of a protein provides sufficient information (one or more sequence tags) to spot it with regard to databases of protein sequences derived from the conceptual translation of genes. the 2 major direct methods of protein sequencing are mass spectrometry and Edman degradation employing a protein sequenator (sequencer). Mass spectrometry methods are now the foremost widely used for protein sequencing and identification but Edman degradation remains a valuable tool for characterizing a protein's N-terminus. it's often desirable to understand the unordered aminoalkanoic acid composition of a protein before attempting to seek out the ordered sequence, as this data are often wont to facilitate the invention of errors within the sequencing process or to differentiate between ambiguous results. Knowledge of the frequency of certain amino acids can also be wont to choose which protease to use for digestion of the protein. The misincorporation of low levels of non-standard amino acids (e.g. norleucine) into proteins can also be determined. A generalized method often mentioned as aminoalkanoic acid analysis for determining aminoalkanoic acid frequency is as follows: 1. Hydrolyse a known quantity of protein into its constituent amino acids 2. Separate and quantify the amino acids in how .