Abstract

Currently no reliable 1st trimester screening method exists to detect for pregnancies, which will develop preeclampsia. This deficit makes it difficult to develop appropriate intervention strategies. As the underlying placental aetiology leading to the development of preeclampsia is thought to occur early during gestation, we hypothesized that such changes may already be evident in the maternal plasma proteome. Hence, such unique proteomic fingerprints could be used to distinguish between pregnancies with healthy deliveries from those, which developed preeclampsia. For this purpose we investigated the use of Surface-Enhanced Laser Desorption/Ionization Time-of-Flight mass spectrometry (SELDI-TOF-MS) SELDI. Unique spectral profiles were generated using SELDI-TOF-MS. A total of 8 peaks corresponding to peptides and proteins in the range between 3.2 kDa and 22.2 kDa were identified from a set of 26,707 representing the whole spectral analysis (0 to 60 kDa), were identified which could discriminate pregnancies with normal deliveries to those which developed preeclampsia. Maternal plasma proteome fingerprinting by SELDI-TOF MS may lead to the development of a set of markers which can be used in discern pregnancies at risk for preeclampsia.

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