Lucid Proteomics System from Bio-Rad and Bruker Combines Top-Down and Bottom-Up Proteomics to Improve Biomarker Discovery

It will be the first system to combine top-down and bottom-up proteomics approaches for biomarker discovery. With both techniques on one platform, the Lucid Proteomics System accelerates biomarker research programs by improving the chances of discovering biomarkers that have clinical relevance.

In the past, researchers have been limited by protein biomarker discovery systems that have required a choice between top-down and bottom-up methods. Top-down proteomics enables processing of native biological samples, critical for the detection and identification of intact proteins and peptides under 30 kilodaltons and discovery of biologically generated protein  cleavages and post-translational modifications as potential biomarkers. The main advantage of the widely used bottom-up approach (proteolytic digestion of proteins prior to mass spectrometry analysis) is achieving high-resolution separations. Although this method has proven successful for profiling and identifying proteins, researchers continue to face challenges when screening for biomarkers, particularly for candidates under 30 kDa.

“To date, very few biomarkers discovered by mass spectrometry have survived through the validation process and were therefore moved into the clinic,” said Julie Hey, Marketing Manager, Protein Detection Business Unit at Bio-Rad Laboratories. “One approach alone may not provide sufficient characterization of the proteome of interest or include enough samples to yield results that are statistically significant.”