Bruker Daltonics’ New ClinProTools 2.1 and flexImaging 2.0 Software Now Permit Integrated Statistical and Image Analysis of Tissue Samples

At the 2006 ASMS conference, Bruker Daltonics today announces its new ClinProTools™ 2.1 and flexImaging™ 2.0 software versions. Together, these integrated software packages allow biologists and clinical researchers to merge statistical analysis on MALDI-TOF profiling spectra with molecular images of tissue distributions of peptide and protein biomarkers. This unique analysis capability is now available on the Company’s novel MALDI Molecular Imager™.

ClinProTools is Bruker Daltonics’ state-of-the art bioinformatics solution for biomarker panel analysis, biofluid profiling, multivariate data analysis of large sample cohorts, classical statistics and sample classification. ClinProTools 2.1 now includes many additional features for data analysis and visualization: the new proprietary Supervised Neural Network™ algorithm allows a third independent multiclass, multivariate analysis approach, complementing the company’s existing Support Vector Machine and Modified Genetic Algorithm. Furthermore, it supports univariate peak statistics and a proprietary QuickClassifier™ algorithm. In addition to these supervised approaches, ClinProTools 2.1 also includes Principle Component Analysis (PCA) for unsupervised data analysis.

Preanalytical effects, such as sample drawing, storage and preparation, have been recently determined to introduce a bias in statistical analysis for sample classification based on biofluid profiling. ClinProTools 2.1 now features a quality control functionality allowing evaluation of data quality by analyzing class internal variations. Data sets originating from one sample class can be tested for unexpected variations before applying them in any comparisons with other sample classes. A new Receiver Operating Curve (ROC) addresses the separating power of all individual signals to discriminate between the sample classes. Resulting sensitivities and specificities are displayed in the ROC plot.

Dr. Wolfgang Pusch, Assistant Vice President for Clinical Research Solutions, explained: “The integration of our ClinProTools 2.1 and flexImaging 2.0 software packages, which is now available to scientists, is a breakthrough in our continued efforts towards advanced applications of MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry in clinical research. This integration permits not only efficient biomarker discovery and validation from large sample cohorts, but also allows the application of the same statistical analysis methods to differentiate between different areas on tissue sections. This paves the way for clinical research on typing of tissue samples, or even for subtyping of different tumor types.”