ASMS and mass spectrometry: expanding the limits.

During this time of declining interest in technical conferences and exhibitions, the excitement and enthusiasm about mass spectrometry (MS) continues unabated. The recent 53rd ASMS (American Society for Mass Spectrometry) Conference held in San Antonio, Texas on June 5-9, 2005 was a resounding success and clearly established the meeting's dominant position in the life science and analytical instrumentation marketplace. It also confirmed the importance of MS to the scientific community and for the manufacturers that supply mass spectrometers and the various associated accessories and supplies.

Year after year ASMS has grown in significance without the need to meet in an entertainment-oriented location like Orlando or New Orleans. The meeting moves about the country effortlessly, providing attendees pleasant and interesting experiences, but always focused on the subject of MS. And that focus is almost obsessive. Although the main meeting agenda did not begin until Monday, June 6, short courses, tutorials and several end-users meetings brought over 3,000 attendees to San Antonio for the weekend to learn about recent technical advances and to hear how various applications can be addressed with MS technology.

Participation set records this year. Attendance was up almost 8% to 5,715, while the number of exhibitors grew from 112 to 137, an increase of 22%. The exhibition has now become a much more important feature of the conference, not just because there are more exhibitors, but also because of the range of products covered and the interest displayed by attendees, who went to presentations in the various hospitality suites during the day and to so-called lunchtime seminars.

So while the meeting is certainly centered on MS, it now addresses chromatography, software, biochemicals and laboratory automation. All the more amazing since a few years ago the organizing committee did not permit products of any type to be exhibited. That said, the exhibition does not detract or compete with the oral presentations and poster sessions, rather it is a very practical and useful complement.

There were also 12 media events or press conferences for members of the press and financial analysts. This was the largest number yet, but this type of event is still a relatively new idea for ASMS. Dionex held its first ASMS press conference to announce a partnership with Applied Biosystems for its triple quad technology (see sidebar, page 6). Another company targeting MS applications outside of the pharmaceuticals market was Syagen Technology, which introduced the Syagen Guardian Explosives Detection Portal, currently in beta testing with the US Transportation Security Administration. Although Agilent has held press conferences at ASMS for the past two years, it did not hold one this year.

A few of the media events were fairly well attended, but suffered from the lack of media attendees and especially a lack of financial analysts. Apparently, the financial buzz that MS had for the investment community a few years ago has dissipated due to the lack of new IPOs and the modest slowdown in MS sales from the boom years. Still, media events, the exhibition and user meetings are all an excellent way to communicate business and product developments.

Of course, first and foremost, the ASMS conference is a technical symposia. And here too, the numbers are astounding. Over 2,400 scientific and corporate posters were displayed over the four full days of the conference, which also included 288 oral presentations, an almost 14% increase from 2004. While clearly an American meeting, there was significant international participation as 27% of attendees were from outside the US with a similar number of internationally authored presentations. Of those attending from outside the US, Canada, the UK and Germany had the highest percentage.

As has been the trend in recent years, life science topics dominated the presentations. These included proteomics, toxicology, drug metabolism, biomarker identification, natural products and a host of other such topics. In addition, there were a modest number of presentations on forensics, homeland security, environmental analysis, surface analysis and petroleum analysis. All of these presentations addressed MS instrumentation, at least tangentially. Many other presentations were specifically focused on particular MS techniques and innovations.

Judging by the MS techniques covered in the various presentations, tandem techniques continue to be popular. Q-TOF and Q-Trap have experienced spectacular utilization, while MALDI, MALDI-TOF and LC/MS hold strong positions. And although FT-ICR, or FT-MS, is not cited as frequently as other MS techniques, it continues to remain a very important technique of growing significance based on innovation.

Without a doubt, the most dramatic product introduction at this year's ASMS was Thermo Electron's LTQ Orbitrap (see page 7). Its revolutionary design, obviating the need for cryogenically cooled magnets, has the potential to impact user preferences for high-end instrumentation. Thermo Electron seems to be specifically targeting the high-end Q-TOF market based on performance specifications. It remains to be seen how much of an impact this new innovation will have as other suppliers continue to introduce and enhance various versions of their Q-TOF offerings.

Pages 6 (see sidebar), 7 and 8 describe the range of technical and collaborative announcements that ASMS brought to us this year, which were significant in size and scope. The pace of innovation in this field seems unabated as each subsequent announcement of improved sensitivity becomes numbing. It is not unusual to see or hear of 10-fold increases in sensitivity on top of already extremely sensitive instrumentation. There must be something like Moore's Law at work. Where it will stop we do not know, but it surely will not be soon. We can only wait to see what is in store for us next year at ASMS in Seattle, Washington, which will be held May 29-June 1, 2006. Do not forget you umbrella.

RELATED ARTICLE: New collaborations announced at ASMS 2005.

* Applied Biosystems/MDS Sciex and Dionex have established an alliance to develop IC-MS/MS and LC/MS/MS solutions. The first solution will provide a system for detection and analysis of drinking water contaminant Percholorate. The companies" work has already been incorporated into EPA Method 332.0, "Determination of Perchlorate in Drinking Water by Ion Chromatography with Suppressed Conductivity and Electrospray Ionization Mass Spectrometry," published earlier this year, addressing IC/MS and IC/MS/MS.

* Applied Biosystems and Invitrogen have formed a strategic co-marketing and re-selling alliance. They will re-sell a combined suite consisting of Applied Biosystems' iTRAQ and ICAT reagents for protein and peptide labeling in tissue samples and Invitrogen's SILAC metabolomic labeling technology for differential protein expression analysis in cell culture samples. Applied Biosystems will also provide software support for SILAC on its TOF/TOF MS products as well as other Applied Biosystems/MDS Sciex MS products. Both technologies are compatible with 1-D gel electrophoresis and together substitute for 2-D gel analysis.

* Bruker Daltonics and SERVA Electrophoresis GmbH will co-market their respective MS systems and Isotope Coded Protein Label (ICPL) stable isotope labeling technology. ICPL enables quantitation of differentially expressed proteins, including modification of all lysine side chains. It is compatible with all LC- and gel-based fractionation and separation techniques and MS types. ICPL is exclusively licensed to SERVA for distribution by Toplab GmbH. Until a 21302 management buyout, SERVA was part of Invitrogen, which acquired it through the purchase of Novex (see IBO 8/15/99).