Sage-N Research SORCERER Platform Implemented by The University at Buffalo for Reliable and Simple Protein Identification
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Sage-N Research, Inc., has announced that the State University of New York at Buffalo’s pharmaceutical sciences research group has chosen the Sage-N Research SORCERER™ platform to assist with its advanced proteomics research.
One of the primary reasons for this was to take advantage of the sophisticated algorithms and server capabilities that the SORCERER offers, as an overall life science platform. The SORCERER will replace the current super-computers that are used within the University’s laboratory to characterize and identify proteins and handle the large amounts of data generated from high throughput mass spectrometers.
The Lab of Clinical Proteomics and Pharmaceutical Analysis, led by Dr. Jun Qu, Assistant Professor at The State University of New York at Buffalo and the Chief Scientist in Bioanalysis in CEBLS, has decided to go with Sage-N Research’s SEQUEST® 3G search engine and Matrix Science’s Mascot®, both hosted on the SORCERER platform, to study a variety of applications including diagnostics and biomarker discovery for cardiovascular diseases, colon, pancreatic and prostate cancer, cocaine addiction, retina degeneration, COPD and HIV.
The SORCERER from Sage-N Research is a “plug and play” appliance for life sciences designed to support multiple software programs and is well suited to researchers in high-throughput laboratories, core facilities and corporate environments. It provides a unique combination of optimized hardware and can be easily customized with different post-processing tools to suit an individual customer’s needs.
The platform also offers high-level server-based solutions for storage, back-up and rapid processing of the complex data-sets generated by high end mass spectrometers.
The University at Buffalo selected SORCERER to be used with both Mascot and SEQUEST 3G, to optimize the search conditions. This solution has replaced the super-computer in the University at Buffalo’s laboratory, as it offers the capability to handle the vast amounts (up to a terabyte) of information generated by a unique long-gradient nano-Lliquid Chromatography Mass Spectrometry (nano-LC/MS) developed in Qu’s lab.
“It has been great to be able to finally deploy both Mascot and SEQUEST 3G on the Sage-N Research SORCERER platform and experience the benefits of two very powerful search engines for important protein ID applications,” commented Dr. Jun Qu.
Dr. Qu continued, “Most members of the industry are still using standalone PC servers which can be time consuming to configure and would consume more power to process the same amount of data. For example, 60k-80k spectra were generated by a single nano-LC/MS run of a clinical sample; in our lab, one typical clinical project will involve the analysis of 2-3 millions of spectra, which is a heavy burden even for a super computer. We have found the SORCERER platform to be very reliable, easy-to-use and the next generation of Information Technology for life sciences.”
In addition, John Cottrell, Director at Matrix Science comments “We are excited that the University at Buffalo has chosen to harness the power of Mascot on the SORCERER platform for its advanced proteomics research. This solution allows users to handle large amounts of data easily and efficiently, accelerating their vital research programs.”