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Projects
As experts in life sciences identify substantive problems, interdisciplinary teams deliver novel instrumentation and information systems for medical diagnostics and drug discovery. The Institute has recently focused on
label-free detection of molecular interactions, protein identification in complex samples, rapid detection of peripheral cancer cells, and other solutions.
Automatic Analysis of Mass Spectra
Mass spectrometry is a ubiquitous tool in proteomics research for identification of proteins and post-translational modifications (PTMs) such as phosphorylation. Current high-throughput methods for protein identification rely on database-lookup techniques and do not scale well for PTM identification. The goals of this project are improved software tools for de novo sequencing of peptides and identification of PTMs. In addition, the project is developing tools for identifying glycans, the focus of the rapidly evolving field of glycomics.
Enthalpy Arrays: Detecting Molecular Interactions
The Scripps-PARC Institute is creating a system to directly measure molecular interaction, eliminating the need to develop a custom assay for each biological system. Currently, direct measurement systems have limitations in speed, sample size, and cost. This project aims to provide a system that scales to parallel operation of hundreds of simultaneous assays, eliminates the need for target-specific assay development, and substantially reduces the amount of material required to determine the key reaction parameters. Such a system will enable the investigation of the myriad possible interactions across the proteome at an acceptable cost.
FAST Cytometer for Rare Cell Detection
Proteomics research requires a fast, sensitive tool to detect and locate rare cells and cellular events. Currently, the most powerful technologies for scanning large numbers of cells, flow cytometry and laser scanning cytometry, have deficiencies limiting their use in proteome-scale research. The goal of this project is to create a fast, robust, and sensitive benchtop instrument for repeated scans of cell populations.
Image Processing for Cryo-Electron Microscopy
Three-dimensional representation of biological structures, from the atomic to the cellular scale, is considered one of the grand challenges in science. Cryo-Electron Microscopy fills a crucial niche in the range from 1 to 100 nanometers, the size of molecular machines and complexes. PARC has developed algorithms and software for automatic identification of target particles within cryo-electron microscope images. Automation is important, because in order to attain a medium- or high-resolution structure, tens or even hundreds of thousands of particle images must be identified, oriented and combined.
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