Quadratic variance models for adaptively preprocessing SELDI-TOF mass spectrometry data

BACKGROUND: Surface enhanced laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (SELDI) is a proteomics tool for biomarker discovery and other high throughput applications. Previous studies have identified various areas for improvement in preprocessing algorithms used for protein peak detection. Bottom-up approaches to preprocessing that emphasize modeling SELDI data acquisition are promising avenues of research to find the needed improvements in reproducibility. RESULTS: We studied the properties of the SELDI detector intensity response to matrix only runs. The intensity fluctuations and noise observed can be characterized by a natural exponential family with quadratic variance function (NEF-QVF) class of distributions. These include as special cases many common distributions arising in practice (e.g.- normal, Poisson). Taking this model into account, we present a modified Antoniadis-Sapatinas wavelet denoising algorithm as the core of our preprocessing program, implemented in MATLAB. The proposed preprocessing approach shows superior peak detection sensitivity compared to MassSpecWavelet for false discovery rate (FDR) values less than 25%. CONCLUSIONS: The NEF-QVF detector model requires that certain parameters be measured from matrix only spectra, leaving implications for new experiment design at the trade-off of slightly increased cost. These additional measurements allow our preprocessing program to adapt to changing noise characteristics arising from intralaboratory and across-laboratory factors. With further development, this approach may lead to improved peak prediction reproducibility and nearly automated, high throughput preprocessing of SELDI data.