High throughput peptide mass fingerprinting and protein macroarray analysis using chemical printing strategies.

We describe a chemical printer that uses piezoelectric pulsing for rapid, accurate, and non-contact microdispensing of fluid for proteomic analysis of immobilized protein macroarrays. We demonstrate protein digestion and peptide mass fingerprinting analysis of human plasma and platelet proteins direct from a membrane surface subsequent to defined microdispensing of trypsin and matrix solutions, hence bypassing multiple liquid-handling steps. Detection of low abundance, alkaline proteins from whole human platelet extracts has been highlighted.