Mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) is rapidly becoming a crucial tool in disease research. Fresh-frozen tissue is ideal for MSI because the protein and lipid structures are undisturbed by chemical fixatives; however, that means long-term preservation is limited. Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissue has a virtually infinite shelf life, but whole proteins are difficult or impossible to image directly. To bridge this gap, we examine the use of ethanol-fixed, paraffin-embedded (EFPE) tissue for the localization of intact proteins and lipids and comment on implications in Alzheimer's disease (AD) research. The new sample preparation methods for EFPE tissues have allowed us to greatly broaden the information we can extract from MSI experiments. Our methods involve a xylene-free deparaffination for lipid analysis and an intact protein method for visualizing amyloid-beta plaques from human AD brain tissue. This unique combination streamlines the MSI sample preparation process while allowing for the most biologically and pathologically relevant information to be extracted from a single tissue source.

中文翻译：

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乙醇固定、石蜡包埋的组织成像：对阿尔茨海默病研究的影响。

质谱成像 (MSI) 正迅速成为疾病研究的重要工具。新鲜冷冻组织是 MSI 的理想选择，因为蛋白质和脂质结构不受化学固定剂的干扰；然而，这意味着长期保存是有限的。福尔马林固定石蜡包埋的组织具有几乎无限的保质期，但整个蛋白质很难或不可能直接成像。为了弥补这一差距，我们研究了使用乙醇固定、石蜡包埋 (EFPE) 组织定位完整蛋白质和脂质的情况，并评论了对阿尔茨海默病 (AD) 研究的影响。EFPE 组织的新样品制备方法使我们能够极大地拓宽我们可以从 MSI 实验中提取的信息。我们的方法包括用于脂质分析的无二甲苯脱蜡和用于可视化来自人类 AD 脑组织的淀粉样蛋白斑块的完整蛋白质方法。这种独特的组合简化了 MSI 样品制备过程，同时允许从单个组织来源中提取与生物学和病理学最相关的信息。