Presented herein is the construction of pipettor tips (termed MSIA-Tips)
containing porous solid supports that are constructed, covalently
derivatized with affinity ligand, and used to extract specific proteins
and their variants from various biological fluids by repeatedly flowing
the fluids through the MSIA-Tips. A second protein species (a
mass-shifted variant of the targeted protein doped into the samples at a
constant concentration) is co-extracted with the endogenous protein and
variants and is used as a quantitative internal reference standard (IRS).
Nonspecifcally bound compounds are rinsed from the MSIA-Tip using a
series of buffer and water rinses, after which the wild type protein,
protein variants and the IRS are eluted from the MSIA-Tips directly onto
a target in preparation for analysis such as MALDI-TOF. Mass spectrometry
of the eluted sample then follows with the retained proteins identified
via accurate molecular mass determination. Protein and variant levels are
determined via a quantitative method in which the protein/variant signals
are normalized to the signal of the IRS and the values compared to a
working curve constructed from samples containing known concentrations of
the protein or variants.