Evolution in the Examination of Single-cell Proteomics

Revolutionizing the method of deducing the full protein complement of individual cells has played the second fiddle to transcriptomics for a long time now.

FREMONT, CA: The single-cell proteomics method examination is one of at least a half-dozen studies published in the last year that explained single-cell proteomics methodology, tools, and preliminary findings, and there will be more. The first annual conference on single-cell proteomics in 2018 drew roughly 50 attendees. More than 1,300 people attended this year's (majorly virtual) conference, to which he added that this was an exponential increase.

Most single-cell studies concentrate on nucleic acids, particularly the transcriptome, which reflects all of the genes expressed in a cell. However, on the other hand, Proteins are the worker bees of the cell. Further, the things closer to the phenotype are the amount, post-translational modifications, and proteoform dynamics.

which means that disease diagnoses, drug response, and all of the human biologies they want to engage with—to regulate, guide, and detect—require proteomics.

Proteomics intends to catalog and categorize the complete complement of protein isoforms in a cell, tissue, organ, or organism. The same gene encodes these proteoforms that contain non-identical amino acid sequences or post-translational modifications. At the single-cell level, however, that is easier said than done. Each form of nucleic acid behaves in a mostly predictable manner. The proteome has a diverse range of chemistries, interactions, dynamics, and abundances. And, because there is no protein counterpart to PCR amplification of DNA, any method for detecting proteins must be sensitive enough to identify them, regardless of how little material a cell consists of.