title: Use of a porous silicon-gold plasmonic nanostructure to enhance serum peptide signals in MALDI-TOF analysis.
abstract: Small peptides in serum are potential biomarkers for the diagnosis of cancer and other diseases. The identification of peptide biomarkers in human plasma/serum has become an area of high interest in medical research. However, the direct analysis of peptides in serum samples using mass spectrometry is challenging due to the low concentration of peptides and the high abundance of high-molecular-weight proteins in serum, the latter of which causes severe signal suppression. Herein, we reported that porous semiconductor-noble metal hybrid nanostructures can both eliminate the interference from large proteins in serum samples and significantly enhance the matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS) yields of peptides captured on the nanostructure. Serum peptide fingerprints with high fidelity can be acquired rapidly, and successful discrimination of colorectal cancer patients based on peptide fingerprints is demonstrated.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Microanalytical Systems, Department of Chemistry, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China.
authors.forename: Xiao
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Institute of Microanalytical Systems, Department of Chemistry, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tan
authors.affiliation: Institute of Cancer Research, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310009, China.
authors.forename: Jiekai
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.affiliation: Institute of Microanalytical Systems, Department of Chemistry, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China.
authors.forename: Jiandong
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Feng
authors.affiliation: Hospital of Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China.
authors.forename: Aiwu
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.affiliation: Institute of Cancer Research, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310009, China.
authors.forename: Shu
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.affiliation: Institute of Microanalytical Systems, Department of Chemistry, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China. Electronic address: wjm-st1@zju.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Jianmin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wu
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D015415:Biomarkers; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms / Q000097:blood*; D004867:Equipment Design; D006046:Gold / Q000737:chemistry*; D006801:Humans; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D049329:Nanostructures / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D010455:Peptides / Q000097:blood*; D016062:Porosity; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012825:Silicon / Q000737:chemistry*; D019032:Spectrometry, Mass, Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption-Ionization / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D010455:Peptides; D006046:Gold; D012825:Silicon
keywords: Gold nanoparticles; Laser desorption and ionization; Plasmonic nanostructure; Porous silicon; Serum peptide