The composition of serum proteins is reflecting the current health status and can, with the right tools, be used to detect early signs of disease, such as an emerging cancer. An earlier diagnosis of cancer would greatly increase the chance of an improved outcome for the patients. However, there is still an unmet need for proficient tools to decipher the information in the blood proteome, which calls for further technological development. Here, we present a proof-of-concept study that demonstrates an alternative approach for multiplexed protein profiling of serum samples in solution, using DNA barcoded scFv antibody fragments and next generation sequencing. The outcome shows high accuracy when discriminating samples derived from pancreatic cancer patients and healthy controls and represents a scalable alternative for serum analysis.

血清蛋白的组成反映了当前的健康状况，可以使用正确的工具来检测疾病的早期迹象，例如新兴癌症。癌症的早期诊断将大大增加患者改善预后的机会。但是，仍然需要一种能满足需要的工具来解密血液蛋白质组中的信息，这需要进一步的技术发展。在这里，我们提出了一项概念验证研究，该研究证明了使用DNA条码化的scFv抗体片段和下一代测序技术对溶液中血清样品进行多重蛋白质谱分析的另一种方法。当区分源自胰腺癌患者和健康对照的样品时，结果显示出很高的准确性，是血清分析的可扩展替代方案。