History of Proteomics

Proteomics: The Systematic, High-Throughput Approach to Protein Expression Analysis of a Cell or an Organism.
Following the release of the Human Genome Sequence data in 2004, humans are considered to have 19,599 genes encoding proteins. Alternative RNA splicing and post-translational modification may result in 1 million or more proteins or protein fragments. As a consequence, the proteome is far more complex than the genome.

Proteomics is the scientific discipline which studies proteins and searches for proteins that are associated with a disease by means of their altered levels of expression and/or post-translational modification between control and disease states. It enables correlations to be drawn between the range of proteins produced by a cell or tissue and the initiation or progression of a disease state and the effect of therapy.

Detailed analysis of the proteome permits the discovery of new protein markers for diagnostic purposes and of novel molecular targets for drug discovery.

The abundance of information provided by proteome research is entirely complementary with the genetic information being generated from genomics. Proteomics will make a key contribution to the development of functional genomics. The combination of proteomics and genomics will play a major role in biomedical research and will have a significant impact on the development of future generations of diagnostic and therapeutic products.

PS Biomarker ServicesTM technologies are ideally placed to accelerate the discovery of differential protein expression in disease and to exploit value from its application in functional genomics through strategic alliances and out-licensing.