Despite the strengths at Purdue, the analytical instrumentation in support of the next generation of biological problems has been stretched to its limits. Biological mass spectrometry is an area at Purdue where a dichotomy exists between the recognized research strengths, that being instrumentation and application development, and the capacity to serve a broad range of individual investigators. The proposal involves the expansion of a highly successful Campus-Wide Mass Spectrometry Center (CWMSC) to foster the development of research programs that aim to conduct modern protein analyses using mass spectrometry. A new Protein Analysis Core of the CWMSC will be developed to house the proposed instrumentation. A versatile Q-TOF mass spectrometer is proposed to be the centerpiece for the challenging protein analysis requiring high sensitivity and mass resolution. There are no similar instruments to serve the NIH user group of 7 major and 8 minor users within a 60-mile radius of the Purdue West Lafayette campus. These efforts will complement the single investigator-based research in the development of instrumentation and their applications and provide a platform for timely transfer of state-of-art approaches in protein identification, quantitation and structural analysis to a broader group of biologists. The home academic units, the Purdue Cancer Center, and a new Bindley Bioscience Center will work cooperatively to ensure the proper management and needed expansion of the Protein Analysis Core occurs in a timely way. There are significant numbers of researchers that will need not only access to this instrument but also additional expertise of a Ph.D. level scientist who has been hired to support this instrumentation and the associated research. Several collaborative projects will also be possible for this Ph.D. level scientists and existing research groups that are involved in the development and applications of mass spectrometry in biology.
