Technical aspects and inter-laboratory variability in native peptide profiling: the CE-MS experience

Mass spectrometry platforms have attracted a lot of interest in the last 2 decades as profiling tools for native peptides and proteins with clinical potential. However, limitations associated with reproducibility and analytical robustness, especially pronounced with the initial SELDI systems, hindered the application of such platforms in biomarker qualification and clinical implementation. The scope of this article is to give a short overview on data available on performance and on analytical robustness of the different platforms for peptide profiling. Using the CE-MS platform as a paradigm, data on analytical performance are described including reproducibility (short-term and intermediate repeatability), stability, interference, quantification capabilities (limits of detection), and inter-laboratory variability. We discuss these issues by using as an example our experience with the development of a 273-peptide marker for chronic kidney disease. Finally, we discuss pros and cons and means for improvement and emphasize the need to test in terms of comparative clinical performance and impact, different platforms that pass reasonably well analytical validation tests.