High resolution two-dimensional electrophoresis (2-DE) and computer-assisted image analysis were used to screen 13 patients suffering from dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) versus 15 control patients for quantitative and qualitative differences in their myocardial protein expression. Right atrial tissue samples were obtained from end-stage failing explanted hearts and control hearts. Fifty-two spots differed significantly in average intensity between the DCM and the control groups. Myosin light chain 2, ventricular (MLC2) and heat shock protein HSP 27 were identified by protein microsequencing and gel map comparison with other databases. These proteins were found to be characteristic protein markers for DCM in the right atrium. In DCM patients, the spot intensity (protein abundance) of MLC2 is increased to 336% and HSP 27 is decreased to 59%, compared to the control group. The HEART-2DPAGE, a World Wide Web-accessible 2-DE database, was used and extended for the presentation of these disease-associated proteins. Retrievable via Internet we present a list of disease-associated proteins, their altered level of expression in DCM, and their position on a right atrial protein pattern. The accession number to protein sequence databases confers a connection to databases like SWISS-PROT to obtain a detailed functional and structural description of disease-associated proteins. New DCM-associated proteins are detected and their presentation in a 2-DE gel protein database is described.
In addition to the recently published HEART-2DPAGE--a myocardial World Wide Web-accessible 2-DE gel protein database--the usage and installation of software tools are described with regard to the hard- and software environments. Further, access to the HEART-2DPAGE from other two-dimensional electrophoresis (2-DE) databases using name or accession code of a protein is now available. Moreover, database images, published in the myocardial HSC-2DPAGE and HEART-2DPAGE databases are compared. Using the warping tool of the common image processing system Khoros the database images are matched and added in order to visualize the effects of warping. The application of such image processing tools is aimed at improving the comparability of protein spot patterns of different gel images available through the net.
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