Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Eugene N Nikolaev.
A simple, fast and direct method is presented for detecting traces of solid explosives on cotton swabs or in particulate samples: ions are transferred into a mass spectrometer after thermal desorption and corona discharge chemical ionization in ambient air; specificity is enhanced using ambient ion/molecule reactions or by conventional tandem mass spectrometry.
Determination of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) genotype has become accepted as the standard procedure in laboratory practice. Genotype assignment helps in disease prognosis and assists in establishing the appropriate duration of treatment. More than 10 types and 70 subtypes of HCV have been described. In Russia the most common subtypes are 1a, 1b, 2a, and 3a, and the types 4 and 5 are relatively rare. The "gold standard" for testing is gene sequencing. However, a variety of other assays had been developed to provide more rapid and cheaper forms of testing. The aim of this study was to determine the HCV genotype by minisequencing followed by matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time of flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectrometry. Fragments of 5' untranslated region of the HCV genome were amplified. Three oligonucleotide primers were designed to detect two sets of genotype-specific single nucleotide polymorphisms. The primer extension reaction was performed using modified thermostable DNA polymerase and in the presence of dideoxynucleosides. The molecular weights of the reaction products were analyzed with MALDI-TOF mass spectrometer. The HCV genotype was determined by registering the particles of the expected molecular weights. The method was used to genotype HCV from HCV-positive blood sera or plasma. The 1a, 1b, 2a, 3a, and 4 genotype HCVs were determined in the samples examined. The data were confirmed by direct sequencing. Thus, we propose a new accurate and efficient method for HCV genotyping based on minisequencing followed by mass spectrometry.
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Capillary liquid chromatography (LC) separation coupled with external accumulation Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance (FTICR) mass spectrometry has recently been demonstrated to have significant potential for proteomics research. Accumulation of an excessive space charge external to the FTICR cell ion trap has been shown to result in increased mass measurement error, undesirable ion discrimination and/or fragmentation, potentially causing misrepresentation or incorrect assignments of lower abundance peptides in the acquired mass spectra. In this work we report on the capability of data-dependent adjustment of ion accumulation times in the course of LC separations, further referred to as automated gain control (AGC). Three different AGC approaches were evaluated based on the number of putative peptides from a tryptic digest of four casein proteins detected in the course of LC/FTICR separations. When compared with the conventional technique, AGC was found to increase, up to a factor of 3, the total number of peptides identified.