HeLa Cell Standard Study
A new study is being run to test the reproducibility of a HeLa cell proteomics standard, being developed by Sjouke Hoving and Hans Voshol from the Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research and Alain Miller of CILBiotech, which several major life science companies are looking to take to market.
If this study is successful, the intent is this standard can be used by any lab, especially those new in the field, to check the reproducibility of their set-up before working with their own samples.
Taking part
We are asking many more labs to run the HeLa cell standard using 2D-PAGE according to the protocol below, scan the results and send them for analysis. To take part simply follow these two steps.
1. Download the standard protocol to run your HeLa cell standard by 2D PAGE
 View Protocol (PDF document) |
We ask that you prepare a few gels, following the supplied protocol as accurately as you can within the limitations of the available equipment. Undoubtedly, many labs have skills that would allow them to optimise the protocol, but the study will fail if we start by doing that. If we can prove that across-lab reproducibility is possible it will help funders and researchers to regain their belief in the power of proteomics. |
If you have any comments, questions or problems with this experiment send an email to support@fixingproteomics.org and it will be forwarded to the relevant person to be followed up.
2. Check the image quality and send your images for analysis
) Click to enlarge and view the separation you can achieve |
To show the separation you can achieve using the protocol this image was taken from a Sypro Ruby stained gel run with 30ul of the standard. When your 2D-gel images are captured and ready for analysis send an email to images@nonlinear.com and you will be sent a secure link with details on how to upload them. Once your images are uploaded they will be registered with a unique ID to make them anonymous prior to analysis. |
Note: As an extra step, feel free to improve the protocol according to your own expertise and share the results with us by emailing support@fixingproteomics.org.
What will happen with my results?
We expect that a paper will come out of this work and you will be kept updated with the findings. Individual labs' results and relative performance won't be identified by name but if you're participating you will be named on the paper if you nominate to do so. Given the rising tide of interest in this issue and the growth in the understanding of its importance, we expect any publication to be high profile.