Scientists at the University of York have praised a new high throughput instrument for revolutionising the way proteomics research is performed
The Applied Biosystems 4700 proteomics analyser was installed in the technology facility at the University of York in July 2002 and a number of research teams have been using it with great success.
Peter Ashton, research fellow in the Department of Biology, explained: "Our group is studying many aspects of the life cycle of the worm that causes schistosomiasis, including the mechanisms that trigger sexual maturity.
We use a number of proteomics techniques to track the patterns of protein expression and phosphorylation that occur in the male and female worms when they first encounter each other." Ashton continued: "Getting enough time on the instruments used to be the bottleneck in our research and we were fairly limited in terms of time and money as to what we could do.
It used to take at least four days to get the data for 100 protein samples using Maldi-Tof MS and electrospray tandem MS.
The 4700 proteomics analyser allows us to do the same amount of work in about 90 minutes and we can think on a completely different level about what we can achieve." He concluded: "The technical support from Applied Biosystems has been exemplary.
Martin Hornshaw looks after us on day-to-day basis and we get a lot of support from the US team.
We are very impressed."
