Scientific reports

The research grant funded by the National Plan for Research-Development and Innovation II comprised three main goals: (i) the return and reintegration of young researcher Dr. Brînduşa Alina Petre in academic and romanian research environment; (ii) the set up of a research laboratory with international visibility and (iii) the action of research itself: purchase of instruments and reagents specific for the proposed topic, experimental work and dissemination of the obtained results. All these objectives were succesfully fulfilled; the research team is harmonized with a built altruistic team spirit revealed by the participating at national and international conferences and by publishing articles in high ranking journals. The scientific report based on the effective experiments and the obtained results is presented as following:

First stage of the Project (Stage I) consisted of a period of documentation and literature selection necessary for theoretical initiation of the new younger team members. Literature and protocols materials were prepared for relatively new techniques introduced in biochemical and analytical chemistry laboratories as they can be applied in the experimental part of the project. These analytical techniques constitute the ground for the research strategy called proteomics. Proteomics is a new research domain used for successful protein identification from complex biological sample mixtures and offers information about their structrure, post-translational modifications and their interaction with differents ligands. Technologies that allow succesfull analysis of hundreds of proteins in one experiment are used in proteomics. However, in many cases these investigations allow us the identification of a protein, but these investigations may not offer informations about the primary structure of the protein (the amino acid sequence). Full characterization of the protein’s primary structure, including PTMS remains a fruitful domain for many years that will follow. Proteomics combines separation techniques for biological samples such as electrophoresis, chromatography and immunology with analysis techniques based on mass spectrometry. Identification of the proteins and of their modifications is usually realized by comparing the experimental data with already known aminoacid sequence that cand be found in an on-line accessible database (for example SwissProt or UniProt). As the manager of the project and superviser of experimental investigations, I considered absolutely necessary to prepare prior to the experimental work, materials available to the whole research team.