- November 2000 Biomics was the largest and most comprehensive global genomics and proteomics congress in Europe. The congress CD Rom and papers address the issues surrounding the completion of the human genome, including it's impact on drug research and development, the use and access of this information, patenting and the economic impact of gene research. Please find 2 Executive Summaries from papers presented at IBC Life Sciences, Biomics Congress. Please click on one of the below options to view the Executive Summary written from that presentation. Peptidomics for human body fluids Z3 - a new system for 2D-Gel image analysis For further information and details of the comprehensive documentation available from this event, please visit: www.Biomics.com Details of Biomics 2001, will be available soon, please visit to receive updates: www.Biomics.com 1. Peptidomics for human body fluids [top] Michael Schrader and Peter Schulz-Knappe, BioVisioN GmbH & Co. KG, Hannover, Germany (m.schrader@biovision.de) Progress in sequencing the human genome results in an increasing demand for data of gene products and their processing. Besides proteins, peptides play a central role in biological processes. Especially in extracellular fluids, many peptides act as biomolecular messengers. One of the most relevant human sources is blood plasma containing the most representative collection of peptides and protein fragments of the entire body. We developed and apply technologies to visualise the multitude of peptides within a biological sample which we call peptidomics. These technologies are based on chromatographic separation and mass spectrometric analysis. The initial overview is performed by automated MALDI-MS generating a fingerprint of more than thousand of the most prominent peptides in mL amounts of human body fluids. This approach thus complements 2D-PAGE analysis of proteins through visualisation of peptides in a range from about 0.5 to 20 kDa. The Differential Peptide Display project aims at the establishment of numerous disease-associated peptide fingerprints from individual human samples and the differential comparison with controls. Diseases lead to differences in the composition of blood, including changes in the peptide pattern of plasma. Data analysis of peptide patterns from patients with defined diseases compared to healthy subjects reveals deviations as potential biomarkers. Target peptides are selected and identified on a molecular level using a Peptide Bank from more than 100,000 L of human blood filtrate and a related database of human circulating peptides. 2. Z3 - a new system for 2D-Gel image analysis [top] Zeev Smilansky, VP Proteomics, Compugen Limited, 72 Pinchas Rosen St., Tel-Aviv 69512, Israel (zeev@compugen.co.il) 2D-Gel electrophoresis is the leading method for separating complex mixture of proteins. Despite its usefulness, 2D-PAGE is hampered by difficulties with the method and even more so the analysis of the results. Z3 is a new software system by Compugen, which relies on methods and usage paradigms that are different than customary methods. Among the novelties of the system are a complementary color display, automatic, raw-image based registration, and direct computation of differential expression.