Proteomic technologies represent new strategies towards high-throughput,
simultaneous analysis of thousands of biological molecules leading to
the discovery of biomarkers for early diagnosis, prognosis and
prediction of pregnancy outcome. Proteomics have additional relevance in
understanding pathophysiology and the development of molecularly
targeted therapeutics. Comparison of normal human amniotic fluid
proteome with that coming from pregnancies carrying fetuses with
chromosomal abnormalities facilitated the detection of panels of
potential biomarkers for prenatal detection of fetal aneuploidies.
Candidate biomarkers for the early prediction of preeclampsis are also
available, while four biomarkers (defensins-2 and -1, calgranulin-C, and
calgranulin-A), which were called the “MR score”, can quickly and
accurately detect potentially dangerous infections and predict premature
birth. Researchers remain hopeful that proteomic studies will allow for
the identification of either one protein marker or of a panel of markers
for prenatal detection of fetal aneuploidies and pregnancy complications
that could be usefully employed for diagnostic purposes or improvement
of the current screening methods. For maximum predictive power however,
biomarkers should be selected for further comparative analysis of
expression and structural modifications in large numbers of samples from
chromosomally normal and abnormal pregnancies obtained from different
populations. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved
