Proteomics team

WA Proteomics Facility

Cutting edge proteomics services delivered through our world class expertise and state of the art instrumentation.

About us

The WA Proteomics Facility is a node of Proteomics Australia based at CMCA. Services are delivered through a joint venture between The University of Western Australia and Proteomics International.

Proteins lie at the heart of all biology. We offer cutting edge services for the analysis, identification and quantitation of proteins as well as specialist services in measuring protein synthesis and degradation rates. At Proteomics Western Australia we offer both deep expertise and a user friendly environment to help you design and execute your studies successfully while we deliver world class data and analysis on WA's state of the art infrastructure. Our enduring aim is to build successful collaborations with the life sciences sector to contribute to Australia’s health, environmental, economic and social wellbeing.

We can also offer support to researchers in the form of grant writing assistance and utilisation of the facility generally qualifies as an in-kind contribution from NCRIS and Bio Platforms Australia, helping your grant applications be the most competitive they can.

NCRIS and Bioplatforms Australia logos
Female staff member of Proteomics

Our services

The services offered by the WA Proteomics Facility focus on:

  • Protein identification to provide evidence to link protein to the gene that encodes it
  • Label free quantitation to reveal the identity and abundance of proteins in a complex sample
  • Targeted proteomics to selectively quantitate specific proteins of interest
  • Flux proteomics to measure the synthesis and degradation rates of proteins

Label free relative quantitation of protein abundances offers a simple and accurate means to compare the abundance of thousands of proteins between samples. This affordable methodology is suitable for both large and small sample numbers and serves to both identify the proteins present in a sample and to measure their relative abundance. Proteins present in each sample are subjected to tryptic digestion followed by individual injection onto our state-of-the-art Orbitap instruments.

We offer two gradient lengths with more complex samples such as whole tissue lysates being ideally suited to longer analysis to allow greater depth of coverage of proteins present and a shorter gradient for less complex samples such as immunoprecipitations and subcellular fractions.

This service includes:

  • Sample digestion
  • Cleanup
  • Mass spec analysis
  • Followed by data processing to supply a spreadsheet of proteins present
  • Their normalised relative abundances across samples

This service can be extended to include a detailed statistical analysis of the data generated along with data visualisation.

Our protein identification service offers a cut price entry to the world of proteomics and is suitable for routine protein identification and sample quality control tasks. Analysed on a short gradient on one of our Orbitrap instruments, this service can provide an extensive list of the protein(s) present in a sample and make estimates as to the relative proportion each protein constitutes of the total sample.

Our targeted proteomics service allows researchers to track the abundance of a smaller number of specific proteins across multiple samples. This analysis has the advantage of allowing the highest confidence measurements of relative abundance available in proteomics as well as the ability to show that the specified proteins are absent (below the limit of detection of the instrumentation). This technique is commonly described as a mass Western but is much faster, more quantitative, not prone to cross reactivity and can generally be tailored to specific isoforms of proteins.

This service includes:

  • Sample digestion
  • Cleanup
  • Mass spec analysis 
  • Followed by data processing to supply a spreadsheet of proteins present
  • Their normalised relative abundances across samples

Protein flux analysis offers the opportunity to understand how much of which proteins are being translated and degraded in your experimental system. These measurements allow a much more detailed understanding of the dynamics of protein biology than simple abundance measurements. In this methodology a pulse of stable isotope labelled substrate is fed into the experimental system which is metabolically incorporated into the amino acid pool and subsequently into newly synthesised protein. By tracking the rate of accumulation of protein with incorporated stable isotopes relative to the pre-existing unlabelled protein, both the rate of translation and degradation can be derived from a set of samples.

Interested in our services?

Please submit an online sample information form and one of our team members will get back to you.

Proteomics Team

Our team

With several decades of dedicated proteomics research combined, our scientists can help you get the most out of your experiment.

The WA proteomics team at UWA:

Proteomics staff member using Proteomics equipment

Our instruments

The Proteomics Facility house some of the most powerful instruments available for delivering quantitative proteomics and flux proteomics services.

  • Thermo Fisher Orbitrap Fusion
  • Exploris 480
  • Triple quadrupole instruments

If you want to understand more about proteomics and how it can relate to your biological questions, contact [email protected].

FAQ

  • How much sample do I need to submit?

    Our sample requirements vary depending on what is needed from the analysis and how expensive it is to generate. 1x10^6 for most mammalian cell types is a good starting point but we can generate good data with tens of thousands of cells if that's what is available. For other sample types, we typically ask for 100ug of protein for complex (contains many different proteins) samples such as cell lysates or a few micrograms for simple samples such as immuno-precipitations.

  • How should I prepare my samples?

    We typically like to receive cell pellets, supernatant removed, then snap frozen and dropped off to the Bayliss building foyer at a time arranged with staff. Where this is not applicable, please contact us so we can give specific advice.

  • How much does your service cost?

    A few examples of pricing for non-commercial research, label free quantitation runs would be:

    • 6 samples ~$1000
    • 24 samples ~$3000
  • What does your service include?

    The standard label free quant service includes protein extraction, quantitation, digestion and sample prep then run on a 90 min LC gradient on one of our orbitraps. Results are provided as a spreadsheet with rows being proteins identified and columns being the samples provided. We can also analyse and provide differential expression results though a bioinformatics fee may be invoked if it's an involved analysis.

  • Can I ask other questions?
    Of course! email [email protected] and we will endeavour to answer swiftly.

Location and contact

Email:
[email protected]

Address:
The University of Western Australia
School of Molecular Sciences
Room G28, Bayliss Building,
Fairway Entry, Crawley WA 6009
 
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