Discovery Of Biochemical Markers For Understanding Disease

The Challenge: Discovery of Disease-Specific Biomarkers Related to Disease Mechanism and Phenotype

With the advent of ‘omic technologies and systems biology research, the search for disease-specific biomarkers has flourished. These technologies provide a comprehensive view of the genetic, protein and biochemical nature of disease. The search for disease biomarkers can yield many different types of biomarkers such as, predictive biomarkers and disease biomarkers.

• Predictive Biomarkers—These biomarkers, usually genetic mutations (e.g., SNPs), are predictive of the development of a disease.
• Disease Biomarkers—These biomarkers, usually proteins and biochemicals, are related to the progression of a disease.

Biochemical disease biomarkers have been used for years to diagnose disease (e.g., glucose for diabetes), systems biology approaches are beginning to uncover the mechanism of the disease as well as early stage markers. These early stage markers are very important to help diagnose and treat disease before it becomes severe.

The Solution: Global Analysis of Biochemical