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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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Prof. Richard Caprioli, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine
Using a Mass Spectrometer as a Camera: Molecular Images of Tissues in Biological and Clinical Research
Peter B. Sherry Lecture
Molecular processes that occur in cells and tissues take place in specific areas and sometimes only at certain times. These spatial and temporal changes are an important aspect for our understanding of how cells work and for life processes in general. There are many technologies that can be used to measure molecules in such samples but perhaps the most specific is mass spectrometry in its molecular specificity, high sensitivity, and high throughput. This seminar will discuss the use of laser based ionization mass spectrometry for the measurement of the molecular distribution of proteins, peptides, lipids, metabolites and drugs within tissue specimens.
Several biological applications of this technology will be discussed, including examples of the discovery of unique molecular processes in mouse developmental models and the profiling of human tumors, characterizing protein differences between tumor grades, and monitoring protein changes due to drug therapy. This technology has also been applied to the creation of 3-D protein images of substructures of mouse brain, to drug targeting and metabolic studies and the measurement of concomitant protein changes in specific tissues after systemic drug administration. Finally, we explore the correlation of lipid and protein changes in several systems in both health and disease.
