Fig. 1

An illustration of the SELDI-TOF MS experimental steps. This starts with sample preparation followed by its application onto a chromatographic array. The samples will then be loaded into the SELDI-TOF MS and targeted with laser. This will ionize the proteins within the sample and will allow them to fly to an oppositely charge electrode in a vacuum chamber. A laser detector will then measure the time of flight (TOF) of each protein which reflects its molecular weight. Using special software the masses will be presented waves corresponding to m/z. This can then be analyzed using different bioinformatic tools to detect any differentially expressed peaks between different groups