Mass spectrometry (MS) imaging has launched a new frontier for spatially-resolved chemical mapping of tissue. The breadth of spatial and molecular information from MS imaging offers outstanding diagnostic, prognostic and mechanistic insight for basic, translational, and clinical cancer research. We propose to expand a state-of-the art MS imaging facility to serve cancer researchers throughout Texas, including those working to understand and combat hepatocellular, ovarian, brain, breast, pancreatic, cervical, and skin cancer, among others. Conventional tissue histological analysis is based on the evaluation of morphological features of the tissue via a sectioning and staining process. In cont...

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Mass spectrometry (MS) imaging has launched a new frontier for spatially-resolved chemical mapping of tissue. The breadth of spatial and molecular information from MS imaging offers outstanding diagnostic, prognostic and mechanistic insight for basic, translational, and clinical cancer research. We propose to expand a state-of-the art MS imaging facility to serve cancer researchers throughout Texas, including those working to understand and combat hepatocellular, ovarian, brain, breast, pancreatic, cervical, and skin cancer, among others. Conventional tissue histological analysis is based on the evaluation of morphological features of the tissue via a sectioning and staining process. In contrast, MS imaging maps hundreds of chemically-specific molecular features that are diagnostic of disease with high resolution. This level of chemical detail provides unprecedented insight into how metabolic pathways and other biochemical processes change in cancer cells relative to healthy cells. The goals include: (1) Expansion of a high performance MS imaging center which provides unique opportunities for diagnostic, prognostic, and mechanistic cancer research. (2) Increasing the opportunities for synergistic collaborations with cancer researchers, guiding their usage of MS imaging for advanced applications, solving high impact problems, and providing innovation for new grant proposals. (3) Advancing the technology and methodology for MS imaging to extend the depth of information harvested from tissue samples by implementation of sequential imaging and integration with other spatial analytical technologies. The projects spearheaded by the MS imaging facility will span fundamental mechanistic studies for targeted analysis of molecular markers in tissue to clinical investigations of novel molecular markers of disease progression and treatment response in patient tissue samples.

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