Protein and chemical microarrays - Powerful tools for proteomics

In the last few years, protein and chemical microarrays have emerged as two important tools in the field of proteomics. Specific proteins, antibodies, small molecule compounds, peptides, and carbohydrates cam now be immobilized on solid surfaces to form high-density microarrays. Depending on their chemical nature, immobilization of these molecules on solid support is accomplished by in situ synthesis, nonspecific adsorption, specific binding, nonspecific chemical ligation, or chemoselective ligation. These arrays of molecules can then be probed with complex analytes such as serum, total cell extracts, and whole blood. Interactions between the analytes and the immobilized array of molecules are evaluated with a number of different detection systems. In this paper, various components, methods, and applications of the protein and chemical microarray systems are reviewed.