A major study from Professor Mathias Uhlén’s group at KTH in Stockholm is the first paper to be published describing a study based on the Olink® Explore platform. Using this high-throughput, high-multiplex protein biomarker discovery solution, they performed a longitudinal wellness study alongside a proteomics analysis of diabetic patients during treatment.
They analyzed the variability of plasma profiles between and within healthy individuals in a longitudinal wellness study, including the influence of genetic variations on plasma levels, and found that healthy individuals have a unique and stable proteome profile. Following patients newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes before and during therapeutic intervention using plasma proteome profiling, they also found indications that a panel of proteins could potentially be used for early diagnosis of diabetes, including stratification of patients with regards to response to metformin treatment.
They concluded that their study demonstrates the value of comprehensive plasma profiling for precision medicine efforts, although validation of specific findings will of course require validation in larger cohorts.
Article details
Zhong W, Edfors F, Gummesson A, Bergström G, Fagerberg L & Uhlén M. Next generation plasma proteome profiling to monitor health and disease. (2021) Nature Communications, DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-22767-z
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Quote from the author
“The method described here has opened up the possibility to perform next generation plasma proteome profiling to allow massive screening of various patient cohorts to provide plasma profiles of relevance for health and disease. This technology allows analysis of minute samples over the challenging dynamic range of plasma proteins, which will be highly beneficial for precision medicine efforts. In summary, we describe an approach suitable for comprehensive protein profiling, taking advantage from the observation that each individual has a unique protein profile and many proteins change during disease allowing stratification and monitoring of patients during treatment.”
Extract from the Discussion, Zhong et al., (2021), https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22767-z