PerkinElmer Offers Enhanced Software for Multiplex Quantitative Protein Expression Profiling

At the American Society for Mass Spectrometry (ASMS) Annual Conference, PerkinElmer Life and Analytical Sciences, a global leader in life science research, drug discovery and cellular science, announced that it has introduced a software upgrade for its patented ExacTag™ technology, an innovative, multiplex platform for quantitative protein expression profiling by mass spectrometry (MS).

ExacTag Analysis Software version 2.0 offers powerful new data visualization and analysis tools, and supports many file formats for wide MS system compatibility. The new 2.0 software is included with ExacTag™ Labeling Kits enabling simultaneous comparison of 2, 4, 7, or 10 samples using any tandem mass spectrometer.

“Multiplex protein labeling and detection coupled with a powerful, versatile Mass Spec analysis software package represent an essential toolset for protein research labs,” said Dr. Richard Eglen, vice president and general manager, Discovery and Research Reagents for PerkinElmer Life and Analytical Sciences. “When measuring quantitative changes in protein expression, the simultaneous sample analysis afforded by multiplexing contributes to greater consistency and reproducibility of the measurements, as well as greater lab productivity, while the advanced software package gives the researchers highly-relevant, functional insights into their data.”

ExacTag Analysis Software uses signal intensity measurements from low mass reporter ions generated in the collision cell of a tandem mass spectrometer and protein identification data from standard databases like Mascot™ or SEQUEST^® to quantify and identify proteins of interest. Version 2.0 software offers researchers the full spectrum of data resolution and more data visualization and manipulation options to hone in or cluster results, and render as visual heat maps.

ExacTag Labeling Kits utilize a family of thiol and amine reactive isobaric mass tags that offer flexibility for the quantification of protein expression of up to 10 samples simultaneously. Researchers can label samples at the protein level and then pool for fractionation/separation to allow for greater complexity reduction and thus higher selectivity, sensitivity and precision in quantitative protein analysis.