Comprehensive analyses of proteins and metabolites

The term ‘proteome’ refers to the sum of proteins and protein variants that occur in an organism. For practical analytical reasons, partial proteomes such as the plasma proteome, proteomes of specific cell types or subcellular compartments are distinguished. New technical developments make it possible not only to identify individual proteins among a multitude of other proteins but also to quantify them simultaneously. In addition, post-translational modifications of proteins such as phosphorylation or glycosylation can be characterized. Furthermore, functional states of specific enzymes or enzyme classes can be represented (‘activity-based protein profiling (ABPP)’). This opens up various possibilities to capture the function of organs or changes in tumors with great accuracy through the analysis of biomarkers in body fluids.

The ‘Proteomics Metabolomics’ section of the DGKL was founded to assess the significance of proteomics research approaches in biomarker discovery and clinical chemistry diagnostics. The working group cooperates with the German Society for Proteomics Research.

The section pursues the following objectives, among others:

• Evaluation of methods for detecting complex proteomes
• Definition of pre-analytical conditions for proteome analysis
• Cataloging of proteins in the human plasma proteome
• Cataloging of proteins from all blood cells (‘Cytomics’)
• Organization of workshops on topics in proteome analysis