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Rise to the biopharmaceutical challenges of today and tomorrow
Biopharmaceutical development demands analytical confidence at every stage—from discovery to characterization. The Thermo Scientific Orbitrap Tribrid Apex BioPharma Mass Spectrometer delivers complete characterization of complex biotherapeutics across modalities.
From peptide mapping and ADC analysis to intact and oligonucleotide characterization, it combines flexible MSⁿ workflows, orthogonal fragmentation, and advanced ion manipulation to provide deeper structural insight in a single platform.
Empower your team with the analytical performance needed to strengthen product understanding, and ensure quality. Accelerate development timelines while improving analytical confidence at every stage. With IR-enabled ETD, PTCR, and native MS, the Orbitrap Tribrid Apex BioPharma MS enables confident analysis of highly heterogeneous molecules.
Applications
Characterize drug conjugates precisely within an LC-MS timeframe
Expand analytical versatility with IR-laser assisted ETD fragmentation, improving sequence coverage. IR-ETD and PTCR MS3 can help resolve multiple conjugation sites and simplify highly heterogeneous spectra.
LC scale analysis of 3 possible conjugation sites.
Sequence coverage increases with use of multiple techniques, all available on one system. To help spread out the fragmentation spectra for improved deconvolution, using new IR-laser to assist ETD (IR-EThcD) produced the most sequence coverage when coupled with PTCR.
The combination of IR-EThcD at the MS2-level and PTCR at the MS3 level (all on an LC-time scale) elucidated, with high signal to noise, the y10 ion, which helps differentiate drug conjugation sites for complete characterization of drug-mAb binding.
What scientists are saying about Orbitrap Tribrid Apex Biopharma MS
"The new Orbitrap Tribrid Apex BioPharma MS builds off the incredible versatility of the Orbitrap Tribrid MS family. Key features include an IR laser allowing ion activation concurrent to ETD, enhancing the fragmentation capabilities of the already powerful radical reaction. The PTCR and native MS options extend the mass detection and isolation range, providing greater insights into extremely heterogeneous top-down or middle-down fragmentation. These combined capabilities allow for LC-timescale characterization of structurally complex biotherapeutics such as ADCs and multispecific antibodies."
Luca Fornelli, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Biology, University of Oklahoma
Identify more peptides for ultimate mAb characterization
Detect more peptides and critical PTMs with IR-assisted ETD (IR-EThcD) to gain deeper structural insight into mAbs and proteins.
Along with 100% sequence coverage for 10 ng injection of Transtuzamab, there is an increase in the number of peptides identified with good sequence overlap when utilizing the new IR-laser in combination with ETD called IR-EThcD.
Characterize oligonucleotides from intact, top-down, or bottom-up methodologies
Comprehensive oligonucleotide characterization requires insight at every structural level and the Orbitrap Tribrid Apex BioPharma MS uniquely enables intact, top-down, and bottom-up analyses within a single platform. Intact analysis confirms overall mass and purity, top-down sequencing reveals full-length modifications and sequence variants, and bottom-up approaches provide high-resolution mapping of impurities, n-1 species, and chemical modifications. Together, these complementary strategies deliver the depth of characterization needed to ensure identity, safety, and regulatory confidence for therapeutic oligonucleotides.
Intact mass analysis of CHO Tyr-tRNA results in ID of multiple impurities and sub-3ppm error. Resolution at 480,000 provides detailed view of each impurity with high accuracy.
Confident identification of large oligonucleotides
Confident identification of large oligonucleotides. (A) Intact mass analysis of CHO Tyr-tRNA results in identification of multiple impurities and (B) sub-3ppm error. Resolution at 480,000 provides detailed view of each impurity with high accuracy. (C) tRNA sequence mapping by LC-MS produces nearly 100% coverage and high abundant fragment peaks, increasing confidence of the identification of large oligonucleotides.
FAQs
Because biopharma applications are so diverse, we recommend customers in this application space include all available options for their systems. This includes Easy-IC, Easy-ETD, PTCR, Direct Mass Technology mode, native MS, and the IR-laser. We recommend the IR-laser because of its ability to assist in native structural analysis including desolvation and IR-ETD for middle-/top-down fragmentation. If the interest is more towards small molecule pharmaceuticals or oligonucleotides, UV-laser maybe a better option since it can provide useful fragmentation for those applications specifically.
Oligonucleotides analysis benefits from many features present on the Orbitrap Tribrid Apex BioPharma MS. One of the most important benefits is the improved fragmentation provided by low-q CID for larger oligonucleotides. The low-q CID feature does not have the propensity to over fragment as HCD-based fragmentation does.
Direct Mass Technology mode is a charge detection mass spectrometry technique where parallel individual ions are collected and direct mass measurements can be achieved. This means there is no need for isotope or charge state distribution for deconvolution.
This benefits biopharma because biotherapeutics have become more and more complex with fusion proteins and modifications like PEGylation. Direct Mass Technology mode can directly give the mass measurement so complex samples can be identified. It is also useful for middle-down or top-down experiments, where the fragmentation pattern is too complex to deconvolute using traditional methods. This can allow scientists to get high coverage of specific variable regions of their products for confirmation.
For Research Use Only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures.