Today, scientists rely on biomolecule snapshots to cure most diseases and medical conditions. Robust instruments and techniques are vital for assessing these diseases and medical conditions. Precision medicine is one area of health care that is increasingly benefiting from technology. Precision medicine includes evaluating the genetics, epigenetics, lifestyle, and environmental influences to select the right therapeutic intervention or preventive measures for a disease or medical condition. Hence, precision medicine is the opposite of the one-size-fits-all approach. It recognizes and considers personalized information for delivering meaningful treatment.
Mass spectrometry analysis services are helping scientists gain insights into the mechanism of therapeutic intervention and disease progression. Hence, a mass spectrometry service company is proving critical in advancing precision medicine. The current article discusses the importance of mass spectrometry service in unlocking precision medicine.
Mass spectrometry services
Today, identifying protein biomarkers is the primary focus in precision medicine. The primary reason for these preferences is that protein biomarkers are a part of the molecular phenotype of medical conditions and diseases. Besides, protein biomarkers are crucial as mutations observed at the RNA and DNA levels may not necessarily translate at the protein level. Hence, protein biomarkers become critical in precision medicine.
However, protein quantification is one such bottleneck for advancing precision medicine. Many bioanalytical assays can quantify a single molecule at a given time. However, disease diagnostics often involve multiple protein biomarkers. Besides, many low-expressed protein biomarkers can be missed as proteins are found in the tissue or serum in high concentrations. Here, mass spectrometry services can come in handy.
Traditional immunoassays often have limitations affecting their applicability in precision medicine. For example,
ELISA assay development can be highly sensitive with a broader dynamic range but may fail in identifying the measured protein biomarkers due to interference or unpredicted non-specific interaction. On the other hand, mass spectrometry is comparatively reagent-free and can analyze multiple samples simultaneously.
Mass spectrometers first convert the study sample into gas ions and then measure the analytes based on their mass-to-charge ratio. The generated spectrum helps researchers identify the original molecular composition of the sample. Besides, mass spectrometers are rapidly advancing. Today, mass spectrometers can easily fit on a benchtop, increasing their accessibility and helping scientists analyze multiple protein biomarkers in a single assay volume. Such high-quality analyses have helped proteomics reach the scale of genomics, dramatically reducing the time required to diagnose a patient.
Mass spectrometers are highly sensitive. They can detect biomarkers present in low abundance, including post-translational modifications. With innovations in methods and instrumentation, peptide-based proteomics has resulted in parallel approaches robust enough to deliver high-quality precision medicine data.
Furthermore, technological advances in liquid chromatography technology, such as high-performance surface systems, employ hybrid inorganic and organic surface technology to form a barrier between the study samples and the metal surfaces. This surface technology eliminates non-specificity and improves the reproducibility, sensitivity, accuracy, and analyte recovery of mass spectrometers. In conclusion, the increase in accessibility and technological modifications in mass spectrometers has made mass spectrometer service providers a focus point in adapting instruments for treating patients via personalized and precision medicine.
Also Read: In Vitro Assay Development for Immunogenicity Testing Services
