New ultrafleXtreme MALDI-TOF/TOF Mass Spectrometer

At ASMS 2012, Bruker announced the launch of the new ultrafleXtreme™ MALDI TOF/TOF system. The ultrafleXtreme™ has been enhanced to offer both increased analytical power and entirely new functionality, extending the applications envelope of MALDI TOF/TOF far beyond the conventional concepts of what's possible in molecular histology, glycoprotein and biopharmaceuticals analysis.

The next-generation ultrafleXtreme system incorporates the Bruker patented smartbeam™ laser, now with up to 2 kHz repetition rate with true-pixel image resolution at 20µm for proteins. This development marks a new milestone in the smartbeam laser technology, designed and manufactured exclusively by Bruker for excellent performance in MALDI mass spectrometry.

While biomarker discovery in large tissue-sample cohorts can now be achieved at extremely high speed, Bruker has also extended the discovery potential of Molecular Histology with the new ImageID™ workflow. The proprietary ImageID workflow is a fully-integrated process to provide scientists with integrated tissue maps for both protein distribution and identification. More than 100 proteins are typically characterized by the ImageID workflow, where consecutive histological sections are processed in parallel to generate complementary datasets in a single software environment for comprehensive analysis. ImageID yields identifications of approximately 80% of all peptides observed in imaging measurements, also those derived from high molecular weight proteins. For the first time, the method can access fixed (FFPE) tissue, allowing molecular histology to be applied to vast collections of archived clinical samples to unlock a potential treasure chest of biomarker data in cancer studies.

The ultrafleXtreme has also become a valuable tool for biopharmaceutical characterization with patented Top-Down T3-Sequencing for revealing terminal modifications, post-translational modifications (PTMs) and sequence impurities. Bruker now presents its rapidly expanding biologics customer base with high resolution intact biomolecule analysis on the new ultrafleXtreme platform. The new MALDI-TOF/TOF system leaps across the conventional boundary between MALDI and electrospray ionization by generating multiple-charged intact protein ions for measurements with mass resolution of greater than 30,000, which can yield isotopic information for 30 kDa proteins, and larger protein molecular weight assignments with better than 15 ppm mass accuracy. Achieved using the new ultrafleXtreme FlashDetector™ and DHAP matrix innovations, this intact protein bioanalytical ability represents a paradigm change for biologics discovery, development and QC.

The ultrafleXtreme's utility for the biopharmaceutical industry and life-science research is further enhanced by Bruker's new GlycoQuest™ glycan search engine which retrieves glycan structure candidates with ease, enabling expert full glycoprotein structure elucidation for every molecular biologist.

"Precise intact biomolecule data at the speed and simplicity of MALDI analysis with full glyco-structure reporting really completes the picture for our biopharma customers," commented Dr. Laura Main, Bruker Daltonics' Biopharmaceutical Market Manager.