Plasma Biomarker Profile Alterations during Variable Blood Storage

[摘要] To the Editor:A major confounding factor in the discovery of disease-specific molecular signatures is the variability in handling clinical blood samples. Consequently, novel protein markers of diseases have failed the “iron test” of validation and implementation into clinical practice because, in addition to patient variability, a range of preanalytical parameters contributes to erroneous results.The temperature of storing, transporting, and processing of whole blood following collection is one factor that has not been standardized. Often, samples are transferred from the local laboratories to centralized biobanks in a cooled environment or even on dry ice.Recently, we established a UK biobank to conduct research into the quality of organs donated for transplantation [UK QUOD (Quality in Organ Donation)], collecting donor blood samples from 60 UK transplant centers (www.Quod.org.uk). Taking into consideration the logistical challenges in a clinical setting for sample collection and biobanking, we favored whole blood sample handling and processing at ambient temperature (22 ± 2 °C) before isolation of plasma by centrifugation and subsequent storage at −80 °C.We explored how the proteome and degradome (proteolytic processing of the proteome) may change when whole blood remains at ambient temperature for 30 min, 8 h, 24 h, and 48 h before plasma preparation. We …

[学科分类] 过敏症与临床免疫学