Performance of MALDI‐TOF MS platforms for fungal identification

Abstract

Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionisation mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) is increasingly used by clinical microbiology laboratories to cope with the need for rapid, cost-effective and accurate identification of microorganisms. Several research teams have recently succeed in identifying moulds using MALDI-TOF MS, which was first adapted to bacteria, then to yeast identification. Since 2004, different commercial firms have released several ready-to-use MALDI-TOF MS platforms. This review describes the similarities and differences between the commercially available systems. In two parts, we first describe and compare the preprocessing and identification steps between the platforms and then compare the identification efficacy of yeast, moulds and dermatophytes species.

Molecular and Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption Ionization–Time of Flight Mass Spectrometry-Based Characterization of Clinically Significant Melanized Fungi in India

“…In addition, extensive variability in morphological characteristics also hinders the acquisition of reproducible spectra (17,18). To minimize the effect of growth conditions on the production of uniform mycelium by fungi, Bruker Daltonics launched, in 2012, an additional spectral library, the Filamentous Fungi Library 1.0, that was constructed using 24-to 48-h-old liquid cultures for complete protein extraction.…”

Diagnostik von Pilzinfektionen

“…Dermapak) versenden. [7]. Ähnlich ist es bei Dermatophyten; hier ist die Identifizierungsrate meist >85 % [7,8].…”

“…[7]. Ähnlich ist es bei Dermatophyten; hier ist die Identifizierungsrate meist >85 % [7,8]. Führen MALDI-TOF und/oder konventionelle Identifikation nicht zum Ziel, kann im Bedarfsfall in einem Labor mit der entsprechenden Expertise eine DNASequenzierung durchgeführt werden [9,10].…”

Identification of Molds by Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption Ionization–Time of Flight Mass Spectrometry

“…As reviewed by Cassagne et al (8), studies reported until 2014 have shown overall rates (95.8% to 99.3%) of successful MALDI-TOF MS-based identification for dermatophyte (i.e., Epidermophyton, Microsporum, and Trichophyton) species (31; also see reference 8 and references therein). As expected, all these studies established their own reference dermatophyte database.…”

“…As stated previously, reference databases and the database query methods (i.e., comparing and subsequent scoring of the similarity of an unknown spectrum to each database reference spectrum) may directly affect the performance of MALDI-TOF MS for the identification of fungi (8). While the reference database provided with each commercial MALDI-TOF MS platform may not be sufficient for routine analyses (see below for specific examples), some authors noticed that increasing the number of mass spectra obtained from distinct subcultures of strains included in the reference spectrum library (i.e., the number of reference entries) would improve the accuracy of MALDI TOF MS-based mold identification.…”