Building Australia's first mass spectrometer: Recognising the achievements of J. Roger Bird.

Following the birth of the field of mass spectrometry at the end of World War I, it was several decades before the first commercial mass spectrometers became available. In the interim, many physicists interested in the nature of matter, and their application to studies in nuclear physics, constructed their own. A young physics postgraduate student, John Roger Bird, was the first to do so in Australia. This article describes his efforts and achievements, featuring technical blueprints, photographs of the instruments and early data, in long overdue recognition of Bird's work at the University of Melbourne.

Mass cytometry and type 1 diabetes research in the age of single-cell data science.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: New single-cell tec. hnologies developed over the past decade have considerably reshaped the biomedical research landscape, and more recently have found their way into studies probing the pathogenesis of type 1 diabetes (T1D). In this context, the emergence of mass cytometry in 2009 revolutionized immunological research in two fundamental ways that also affect the T1D world: first, its ready embrace by the community and rapid dissemination across academic and private science centers alike established a new standard of analytical complexity for the high-dimensional proteomic stratification of single-cell populations; and second, the somewhat unexpected arrival of mass cytometry awoke the flow cytometry field from its seeming sleeping beauty stupor and precipitated substantial technological advances that by now approach a degree of analytical dimensionality comparable to mass cytometry. RECENT FINDINGS: Here, we summarize in detail how mass cytometry has thus far been harnessed for the pursuit of discovery studies in T1D science; we provide a succinct overview of other single-cell analysis platforms that already have been or soon will be integrated into various T1D investigations; and we briefly consider how effective adoption of these technologies requires an adjusted model for expense allocation, prioritization of experimental questions, division of labor, and recognition of scientific contributions. SUMMARY: The introduction of contemporary single-cell technologies in general, and of mass cytometry, in particular, provides important new opportunities for current and future T1D research; the necessary reconfiguration of research strategies to accommodate implementation of these technologies, however, may both broaden research endeavors by fostering genuine team science, and constrain their actual practice because of the need for considerable investments into infrastructure and technical expertise.

Lipid mass spectrometry: A path traveled for 50 years.

In the middle of the 1960s, I began graduate school and at the same time started on the path of using mass spectrometry to gain insight into various aspects of lipid biochemistry. This was not a straight path but one that went from organic geochemistry, to lunar sample analysis, to a pursuit of the structure of an elusive and very active, lipid mediator slow reacting substance of anaphylaxis (SRS-A). The discovery of the structure of SRS-A opened important questions about phospholipid biochemistry and the arachidonate cycle in cells. I have written this reflection to highlight the various advances in mass spectrometry that occurred during this time that had a great impact on our ability to study lipid biochemistry. I specifically applied these new advances to studies of leukotriene biosynthesis in vivo, leukotriene metabolism, and arachidonate-containing phospholipids that are essential in providing arachidonic acid for the 5-lipoxygenase pathway. Along the way, imaging mass spectrometry was shown to be a powerful tool to probe lipids as they exist in tissue slices. We found this as just one of the ways to use the emerging technology of lipidomics to study human pathophysiology. Our studies of neutral lipids and oxidized phospholipids were especially challenging due to the total number of molecular species that could be found in cells. Many challenges remain in using mass spectrometry for lipid studies, and a few are presented.

Biophysical Techniques in Structural Biology.

Over the past six decades, steadily increasing progress in the application of the principles and techniques of the physical sciences to the study of biological systems has led to remarkable insights into the molecular basis of life. Of particular significance has been the way in which the determination of the structures and dynamical properties of proteins and nucleic acids has so often led directly to a profound understanding of the nature and mechanism of their functional roles. The increasing number and power of experimental and theoretical techniques that can be applied successfully to living systems is now ushering in a new era of structural biology that is leading to fundamentally new information about the maintenance of health, the origins of disease, and the development of effective strategies for therapeutic intervention. This article provides a brief overview of some of the most powerful biophysical methods in use today, along with references that provide more detailed information about recent applications of each of them. In addition, this article acts as an introduction to four authoritative reviews in this volume. The first shows the ways that a multiplicity of biophysical methods can be combined with computational techniques to define the architectures of complex biological systems, such as those involving weak interactions within ensembles of molecular components. The second illustrates one aspect of this general approach by describing how recent advances in mass spectrometry, particularly in combination with other techniques, can generate fundamentally new insights into the properties of membrane proteins and their functional interactions with lipid molecules. The third reviewdemonstrates the increasing power of rapidly evolving diffraction techniques, employing the very short bursts of X-rays of extremely high intensity that are now accessible as a result of the construction of free-electron lasers, in particular to carry out time-resolved studies of biochemical reactions. The fourth describes in detail the application of such approaches to probe the mechanism of the light-induced changes associated with bacteriorhodopsin's ability to convert light energy into chemical energy.

Integrative Structure Modeling: Overview and Assessment.

Integrative structure modeling computationally combines data from multiple sources of information with the aim of obtaining structural insights that are not revealed by any single approach alone. In the first part of this review, we survey the commonly used sources of structural information and the computational aspects of model building. Throughout the past decade, integrative modeling was applied to various biological systems, with a focus on large protein complexes. Recent progress in the field of cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) has resolved many of these complexes to near-atomic resolution. In the second part of this review, we compare a range of published integrative models with their higher-resolution counterparts with the aim of critically assessing their accuracy. This comparison gives a favorable view of integrative modeling and demonstrates its ability to yield accurate and informative results. We discuss possible roles of integrative modeling in the new era of cryo-EM and highlight future challenges and directions.

IMass Time: The Future, in Future!

Joseph John Thomson discovered and proved the existence of electrons through a series of experiments. His work earned him a Nobel Prize in 1906 and initiated the era of mass spectrometry (MS). In the intervening time, other researchers have also been awarded the Nobel Prize for significant advances in MS technology. The development of soft ionization techniques was central to the application of MS to large biological molecules and led to an unprecedented interest in the study of biomolecules such as proteins (proteomics), metabolites (metabolomics), carbohydrates (glycomics), and lipids (lipidomics), allowing a better understanding of the molecular underpinnings of health and disease. The interest in large molecules drove improvements in MS resolution and now the challenge is in data deconvolution, intelligent exploitation of heterogeneous data, and interpretation, all of which can be ameliorated with a proposed IMass technology. We define IMass as a combination of MS and artificial intelligence, with each performing a specific role. IMass will offer advantages such as improving speed, sensitivity, and analyses of large data that are presently not possible with MS alone. In this study, we present an overview of the MS considering historical perspectives and applications, challenges, as well as insightful highlights of IMass.

Historical and contemporary stable isotope tracer approaches to studying mammalian protein metabolism.

Over a century ago, Frederick Soddy provided the first evidence for the existence of isotopes; elements that occupy the same position in the periodic table are essentially chemically identical but differ in mass due to a different number of neutrons within the atomic nucleus. Allied to the discovery of isotopes was the development of some of the first forms of mass spectrometers, driven forward by the Nobel laureates JJ Thomson and FW Aston, enabling the accurate separation, identification, and quantification of the relative abundance of these isotopes. As a result, within a few years, the number of known isotopes both stable and radioactive had greatly increased and there are now over 300 stable or radioisotopes presently known. Unknown at the time, however, was the potential utility of these isotopes within biological disciplines, it was soon discovered that these stable isotopes, particularly those of carbon (13 C), nitrogen (15 N), oxygen (18 O), and hydrogen (2 H) could be chemically introduced into organic compounds, such as fatty acids, amino acids, and sugars, and used to "trace" the metabolic fate of these compounds within biological systems. From this important breakthrough, the age of the isotope tracer was born. Over the following 80 yrs, stable isotopes would become a vital tool in not only the biological sciences, but also areas as diverse as forensics, geology, and art. This progress has been almost exclusively driven through the development of new and innovative mass spectrometry equipment from IRMS to GC-MS to LC-MS, which has allowed for the accurate quantitation of isotopic abundance within samples of complex matrices. This historical review details the development of stable isotope tracers as metabolic tools, with particular reference to their use in monitoring protein metabolism, highlighting the unique array of tools that are now available for the investigation of protein metabolism in vivo at a whole body down to a single protein level. Importantly, it will detail how this development has been closely aligned to the technological development within the area of mass spectrometry. Without the dedicated development provided by these mass spectrometrists over the past century, the use of stable isotope tracers within the field of protein metabolism would not be as widely applied as it is today, this relationship will no doubt continue to flourish in the future and stable isotope tracers will maintain their importance as a tool within the biological sciences for many years to come. © 2016 The Authors. Mass Spectrometry Reviews Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Mass Spec Rev.

[Historical perspective of mass spectrometry in microbiology]. / Perspectiva histórica de la espectrometría de masas en microbiología.

La espectrometría de masas (EM) es una técnica de análisis que permite caracterizar muestras midiendo las masas (estrictamente las razones masa-carga) de las moléculas componentes. Cuenta con más de un siglo de historia y evolución tecnológica y a lo largo de los años ha ampliado su alcance desde los isótopos a moléculas pequeñas, moléculas orgánicas más complejas y, en las últimas décadas, macromoléculas (ácidos nucleicos y proteínas). La EM MALDI-TOF (matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight) es una variante que permite el análisis de mezclas complejas de proteínas y que se ha aplicado recientemente a la identificación de microorganismos en cultivo, convirtiéndose en una herramienta rápida y eficaz para el diagnóstico microbiológico que ha conseguido entrar en poco tiempo en la rutina de muchos servicios de microbiología clínica. El gran impacto que ha tenido está impulsando el desarrollo de nuevas aplicaciones en el campo de la microbiología clínica.

Perspectiva histórica de la espectrometría de masas en microbiología / Historical perspective of mass spectrometry in microbiology

La espectrometría de masas (EM) es una técnica de análisis que permite caracterizar muestras midiendo las masas (estrictamente las razones masa-carga) de las moléculas componentes. Cuenta con más de un siglo de historia y evolución tecnológica y a lo largo de los años ha ampliado su alcance desde los isótopos a moléculas pequeñas, moléculas orgánicas más complejas y, en las últimas décadas, macromoléculas (ácidos nucleicos y proteínas). La EM MALDI-TOF (matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight) es una variante que permite el análisis de mezclas complejas de proteínas y que se ha aplicado recientemente a la identificación de microorganismos en cultivo, convirtiéndose en una herramienta rápida y eficaz para el diagnóstico microbiológico que ha conseguido entrar en poco tiempo en la rutina de muchos servicios de microbiología clínica. El gran impacto que ha tenido está impulsando el desarrollo de nuevas aplicaciones en el campo de la microbiología clínica

Mass spectrometry (MS) is an analytical technique that allows samples to be characterized by measuring the masses (strictly speaking their mass-to-charge ratio) of the component molecules. This technique has been used for more than one hundred years and technological development throughout this time has broadened its scope from isotopes to small molecules, more complex organic molecules, and in the last few decades, macromolecules (nucleic acids and proteins). MALDI-TOF (matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight) MS is a variant that allows analysis of complex mixtures of proteins and has recently been applied to the identification of cultured microorganisms, making it a rapid and effective tool for microbiological diagnosis. In a short time, MALDI-TOF MS has become a routinely used technique in many clinical microbiology services and its strong impact is prompting the development of new applications in the field of clinical microbiology

Structure Determination of Natural Products by Mass Spectrometry.

I review laboratory research on the development of mass spectrometric methodology for the determination of the structure of natural products of biological and medical interest, which I conducted from 1958 to the end of the twentieth century. The methodology was developed by converting small peptides to their corresponding polyamino alcohols to make them amenable to mass spectrometry, thereby making it applicable to whole proteins. The structures of alkaloids were determined by analyzing the fragmentation of a known alkaloid and then using the results to deduce the structures of related compounds. Heparin-like structures were investigated by determining their molecular weights from the mass of protonated molecular ions of complexes with highly basic, synthetic peptides. Mass spectrometry was also employed in the analysis of lunar material returned by the Apollo missions. A miniaturized gas chromatograph mass spectrometer was sent to Mars on board of the two Viking 1976 spacecrafts.

Bibliometric mapping: eight decades of analytical chemistry, with special focus on the use of mass spectrometry.

In this Feature we use automatic bibliometric mapping tools to visualize the history of analytical chemistry from the 1920s until the present. In particular, we have focused on the application of mass spectrometry in different fields. The analysis shows major shifts in research focus and use of mass spectrometry. We conclude by discussing the application of bibliometric mapping and visualization tools in analytical chemists' research.

Warwick Hillier: a tribute.

Warwick Hillier (October 18, 1967-January 10, 2014) made seminal contributions to our understanding of photosynthetic water oxidation employing membrane inlet mass spectrometry and FTIR spectroscopy. This article offers a collection of historical perspectives on the scientific impact of Warwick Hillier's work and tributes to the personal impact his life and ideas had on his collaborators and colleagues.