The next Step: Exploring the Proteome:
Translation and Beyond

Proteomics for Clinical and Research Use:
Combining Protein Chips, 2D Gels and Mass Spectrometry

N. Leigh Anderson, Ph.D.
Chief Scientific Officer, Large Scale Proteomics Corporation


Abstract:

Three streams of technology will play major roles in quantitative (expression) proteomics over the coming decade. Two-dimensional electrophoresis and mass spectrometry represent well-established methods for, respectively, resolving and characterizing proteins, and both have now been automated to enable the high-throughput generation of data from large numbers of samples. These methods can be powerfully applied to discover proteins of interest as diagnostics, small molecule therapeutic targets, and protein therapeutics. However, neither offers a simple, rapid, routine way to measure many proteins in common samples like blood or tissue homogenates. Protein chips do offer this possibility, and thus complete the triumvirate of technologies that will deliver the benefits of proteomics to both research and clinical users. Integration of efforts in all three approaches will be discussed, highlighting the application of the Human Protein Index® database as a source of protein leads.

Biographical sketch:

N. Leigh Anderson, Ph D. is Chief Scientific Officer of the Proteomics subsidiary of Large Scale Biology Corporation (LSBC). Dr. Anderson obtained his B.A. in Physics with honors from Yale and a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from Cambridge University (England) where he worked with M. F. Perutz as a Churchill Fellow at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology. Subsequently he co-founded the Molecular Anatomy Program at the Argonne National Laboratory (Chicago) where his work in the development of 2D electrophoresis and molecular database technology earned him, among other distinctions, the American Association for Clinical Chemistry's Young Investigator Award for 1982 and the 1983 Pittsburgh Analytical Chemistry Award.

In 1985 Dr. Anderson co-founded LSBC in order to pursue commercial development and large scale applications of 2-D electrophoretic protein mapping technology. This effort has resulted in a large-scale proteomics analytical facility supporting research work for LSBC and its pharmaceutical industry partners. Dr. Anderson’s current primary interests are in the automation of proteomics technologies, and the expansion of LSBC’s proteomics databases describing drug effects and disease processes in vivo and in vitro. Large Scale Biology went public in August 2000.

Dr. Anderson holds 10 patents and has written one book and over 100 scientific publications, mainly in the area of proteomics and its applications.

Contact Information:

Dr. N. Leigh Anderson, Chief Scientific Officer, Large Scale Proteomics Corporation, 20451 Goldenrod Lane, Germantown, MD 20876.
Phone: 301-354-1272, Fax: 301-354-1300, e-mail: leigh.anderson@lsp.lsbc.com.