Bruker Daltonics introduces new molecular imager
Imager, a system for in-vitro imaging of peptide and protein
biomarker distributions in tissue sections and cell clusters. The
imager addresses the need for high-sensitivity imaging of the
spatial distribution of protein biomarkers in clinical research.
The MALDI Molecular Imager can be of great value in pharmacology, for example for peptide and protein tissue characterisation in transgenic animal models, as well as in basic biological research.
The technology is an important tool for histological research projects. In comparison to immuno-histochemical techniques, it is of special interest that there is neither a need for labelling of biomarkers, nor for the use of antibodies.
Moreover, direct profiling of cancer regions identified in tissue biopsies in many cases allows for a sub-typing of tumours, thus giving clinicians additional information for diagnosis and therapy decisions.
The imager uses an autoFlex MALDI-TOF mass spectrometer equipped with proprietary smartbeam laser technology for high-throughput MALDI Imaging.
The technology also incorporates powerful flexImaging visualisation and image processing software. The addition further expands >Bruker Daltonics' Clinprot product line for clinical proteomics and protein biomarker analysis.
The imager can be applied whenever tissue sections are used to evaluate cellular histology and to monitor the spatial distribution of biomarkers, e.g. in pathology, morphology, oncology or neurology, and many other clinical research fields.
"Biomarker discovery will benefit enormously from the direct analysis of tissue sections by MALDI-MS. Gaining knowledge about the spatial localisation of proteins and compounds in tissue will also provide invaluable knowledge to drug candidate research and chemical compound monitoring in animal and plant tissue," said Richard Caprioli, director, Mass Spectrometry Research Centre at the Vanderbilt University Medical Centre.
