There is no better measure for the success of an analytical technology than its widespread adoption by the people who need the best data! As news of the capabilities and applications of mass photometry spreads, more and more scientists are choosing to use it. In fact, the number of scientific publications relying on mass photometry has grown by an average of 168% per year over the past 6 years. In August 2024, we hit a new milestone: 500 mass photometry papers! For a technology as young as mass photometry, that is truly remarkable.
To mark the occasion, the Refeyn team has been sharing their favorite mass photometry papers on LinkedIn (#MassPhotometry500). While it may not be a very scientific approach, they have chosen studies that showcase powerful applications of mass photometry (from antibodies to AAVs, membrane proteins and protein interactions) as well as innovative papers pushing the limits of what it can do. Here they are!
One of the original papers introducing mass photometry and its applications, by Young et al. (2018). Here, the authors explained the principles behind mass photometry and applied it to a variety of different systems – lipid nanodiscs, glycoproteins, streptin-avidin complexes, etc. – to demonstrate its capabilities.
This is Scientific Communications Manager Catie Lichten’s pick. “A classic,” she says, from “when 'mass photometry' was still referred to as 'iSCAMS'
Paul et al. (2022) explore aggregation in tau protein, whose aggregates are linked to diseases including Alzheimer’s and frontotemporal dementia. The authors demonstrate how mass photometry can resolve individual oligomer populations and quantify their abundance in real time.
Principal Application Scientist Gogulan Karunanithy picked this paper, because, he said, "As a biophysics nerd I can't help but get excited by the impressive kinetic modelling!”
Graphical abstract from Paul et al. (2022), linked above.
Gizardin-Fredon et al. (2024) describes a new application for mass photometry. The authors developed a procedure to apply mass photometry to the analysis of cross-linking reactions, showing that it is faster and more precise than SDS-PAGE – the current standard technique.
Technical Sales Specialist Islay Campbell chose this study. She considers that the ability to quickly and easily check the contents of your protein preparations – so you aren't starting your more complex analyses blind – is one of the biggest use cases of mass photometry for structural biology.
Webby et al. (2022) used mass photometry to study assemblies of membrane proteins from E. coli, showing that the outer membrane lipids act as mortar to join proteins into a protective lattice. They also used mass photometry to resolve complex ensembles of outer membrane proteins solubilized in detergent.
This publication was Director of Product Management Catia Crespo’s choice, because “it demonstrates how easy it is to understand complex protein integrations when using mass photometry”.
Mass photometry plot of the results of membrane protein measurements.
This publication by Hiemenz et al. (2023) shows three different ways of using mass photometry to estimate the length of the genome load inside AAV capsids, expanding even more on mass photometry’s AAV analytics capabilities.
Our Director of Sustaining Engineering, Lewis Carney, chose this paper.
Wagner et al. (2024) show how mass photometry can be used to analyze AAV samples in the early stages of production – providing comparable data to AUC.
This paper, from authors at Takeda and Baxalta, was one of two chosen by our Director of Product Marketing, Svea Cheeseman, who was excited to see mass photometry applied to crude extracts.
Figure 7 from Wagner et al. (2024), linked above.
In this 2019 classic, authors Di Wu and Gregor Piszczek, from the NIH Biophysics Core Facility, used mass photometry to measure protein-protein interaction affinity. They measured the stoichiometries and binding affinities of two different antibody-antigen interactions, validating the result with ITC and BLI.
Sales Director Candi Mach selected this paper, commenting: “The first time I heard of mass photometry was during a visit to the NIH Biophysics core lab in 2018. It sounded like the perfect orthogonal tool for SPR or BLI, the tools I used the most for antibody characterization. That conversation inspired me to join Refeyn; seeing the value this new technology could bring to scientists was inspiring.”
This publication by Radić et al. (2021) used mass photometry to characterize complex formation in monoclonal and bi-specific antibodies targeting SARS-CoV-2 and found that bi-specific antibodies were highly effective in binding to the virus. It highlights one of the ways that mass photometry can contribute to antibody development.
This paper was selected by Chief Marketing Officer Fiona Coats, as it is a great example of researchers expanding the application space of mass photometry.
In this 2021 paper, Bigelyte et al. used mass photometry to evaluated the oligomeric state of two CRISPR-Cas nucleases, in complex with gRNA and bound to a dsDNA target.
Adapted from Fig. 2E from Bigelyte et al. (2021), linked above.
This was another pick from Svea Cheeseman, who says, “Protein-DNA/RNA interactions are difficult to characterize with conventional technologies... Mass photometry can be used to even unravel complex stoichiometries of dCas12f1–gRNA–DNA binding.”
Finally, I chose a paper where a library of nurse sharks antibodies were screened for their ability to target the S2 subunit of SARS-CoV-2. Mass photometry was used to estimate the binding affinity of one of the most promising candidates – which could not be characterized by other techniques.
Although the paper and the application were both interesting, I mainly chose this one because I did not now that shark antibodies could be used like this, and I loved learning about it!
If you want to see more, check out our publications database. If you’d rather watch than read, a large collection of webinars is available in our YouTube channel.
And if you want to be part of the journey to 1000 papers, book a demo now.
Author: Nico Palanca, Refeyn Scientific Communications Specialist.
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