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A chemist from Florida State University has been acknowledged for creating an innovative technique for analyzing human genetics that will enhance the ability to comprehend and prevent illnesses.

Christian Bleiholder, an associate professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, received the Ron Hites Award from the American Society for Mass Spectrometry for his lab’s publication, “Top-Down Protein Analysis by Tandem-Trapped Ion Mobility Spectrometry/Mass Spectrometry (Tandem-TIMS/MS) Coupled with Ultraviolet Photodissociation (UVPD) and Parallel Accumulation/ Serial Fragmentation (PASEF) MS/MS Analysis,” which appeared in the Journal of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry in 2023.

“Winning this award is especially significant, as it highlights all that my lab has achieved over the last ten years,” remarked Bleiholder. “We believe that our novel method for analyzing proteins produced by individual human genes will yield meaningful insights and facilitate innovative therapeutic strategies for cancer, neurodegenerative diseases, and infectious illnesses.”

The Ron Hites Award is granted annually for an outstanding paper published in the last two volumes of the Journal of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry, which is the official journal of ASMS, recognizing exemplary original research contributions.

“This accolade reflects the department’s excellence in research initiatives and highlights the leadership roles our faculty occupy in their fields,” stated Wei Yang, chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. “A crucial element of our research program involves advancing and innovating tools, methods, and strategies that push the limits of contemporary science. Dr. Bleiholder’s contributions are a clear embodiment of this objective.”

The principal author of the paper, Fanny Liu, is a research faculty member at the Bleiholder Laboratory, which investigates the structure and dynamics of human biological systems at the molecular level to gain a deeper understanding of the causes of illness. Coauthors include Mark Ridgeway, Christopher Wootton, Alina Theisen, Erin Panczyk, and Melvin Park, research scientists with Bruker Daltonics, a close collaborator with the Bleiholder Laboratory and a leading manufacturer of scientific instruments globally. Coauthor Florian Meier serves as a junior professor of medicine at Jena University Hospital in Germany.

“It is widely acknowledged that the human genome, or the entirety of a person’s DNA, consists of about 20,000 genes,” Bleiholder noted. “Nevertheless, it is less known that these genes produce several hundred thousand distinct proteins, each serving unique functions, forms, and roles in health and disease. Grasping the intricacy of these proteins is a fundamental challenge in biology and is vital for precision in medical treatment, pharmaceutical development, and early disease diagnosis.”

The existence of merely 20,000 genes has long puzzled researchers, as human biology is significantly more complicated than this figure implies. This inconsistency is clarified by each gene’s capacity to produce multiple types of proteins known as proteoforms. Due to technical hurdles, only approximately 5 percent of all human proteoforms have been recognized.

“Our research presents a new analytical method with the potential to identify and characterize proteoforms more accurately, including nuanced variations that conventional techniques often overlook,” Bleiholder stated.

To address existing constraints, the Bleiholder Laboratory has established a fresh analytical platform that utilizes the individual strengths of three distinct mass spectrometry techniques to measure and characterize molecules based on their mass and electric charge. Tandem-trapped ion mobility spectrometry differentiates molecules based on their movement within a gas before analyzing them with mass spectrometry. Ultraviolet photodissociation harnesses light to isolate individual molecules from larger compounds for examination, and lastly, parallel accumulation–serial fragmentation tandem-mass spectrometry accelerates and boosts the sensitivity of mass spectrometry.

“My peers and mentors in the mass spectrometry field continually inspire my efforts,” Bleiholder expressed. “Alan Marshall — Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor of chemistry and biochemistry — and Michael Bowers — my postdoctoral advisor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and distinguished professor of chemistry and biochemistry — have greatly shaped my personal and professional journey. My doctoral mentors, Béla Paizs, head of molecular structure elucidation at the Rosalind Franklin Institute, and Rolf Gleiter, emeritus professor of organic chemistry at Heidelberg University in Germany, encouraged me to creatively address challenging problems.”

To discover more about the research undertaken in FSU’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, visit chem.fsu.edu. For further information regarding the work in the Bleiholder Laboratory, visit chem.fsu.edu/~bleiholder.

The post FSU chemist honored for discovering new way to study human genes, understand disease appeared first on Florida State University News.

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