title: Serum low-molecular-weight protein fractionation for biomarker discovery.
abstract: Protein biomarkers provide the key diagnostic information for the detection of disease, risk of disease progression, and a patient's likely response to drug therapy. Potential biomarkers exist in biofluids, such as serum, urine, and cerebrospinal fluid. Unfortunately, discovering and validating protein biomarkers are hindered by the presence of high-molecular-weight proteins, such as serum albumin and immunoglobulins, which comprise 90% of the proteins present in these samples. High-abundance, high-molecular-weight proteins mask the low-molecular-weight (LMW) proteins and peptides using conventional protein detection methods. Candidate biomarkers are believed to exist in very low concentrations and comprise less than 1% of serum proteins, and may be highly labile as well. Therefore, it is imperative to isolate and enrich LMW proteins from complex mixtures for biomarker discovery. This chapter describes a continuous -elution electrophoresis method, based on molecular weight sieving, to isolate specific molecular weight fractions for mass spectrometric, western blotting, or protein array analysis.
authors.affiliation: Center for Applied Proteomics and Molecular Medicine, George Mason University, Manassas, VA, USA. avanmete@gmu.edu
authors.forename: Amy J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: VanMeter
authors.forename: Serena
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Camerini
authors.forename: Maria Letizia
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Polci
authors.forename: Alessandra
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Tessitore
authors.forename: Nishant
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Trivedi
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Heiby
authors.forename: Yasmin
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kamal
authors.forename: Jonathan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hansen
authors.forename: Weidong
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhou
mesh_terms: D015415:Biomarkers / Q000097:blood; D001798:Blood Proteins / Q000032:analysis* / Q000737:chemistry*; D015153:Blotting, Western; D005591:Chemical Fractionation / Q000379:methods*; D002853:Chromatography, Liquid; D006801:Humans; D013058:Mass Spectrometry; D008970:Molecular Weight; D040081:Protein Array Analysis; D040901:Proteomics / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D001798:Blood Proteins