Abstract
Data-dependent precursor ion selection is widely used in shotgun proteomics to profile the protein components of complex samples. Although very popular, this bottom-up method presents major drawbacks in terms of detectable dynamic range. Recently, we demonstrated the superior performance of a data-independent method we termed precursor acquisition independent from ion count (PAcIFIC). Here, we report a faster, accurate, multiplexed, and quantitative PAcIFIC method. Our results show that the time needed to perform such analysis can be decreased by 33% to 66% using modern ion trap instruments and that high mass accuracy can be applied to such a strategy. Quantification capability is demonstrated on protein standards and a whole bacterial cell lysate using isobaric tagging. Finally, we confirm in yeast the dynamic range capabilities of such a method where proteins down to less than 50 copies per cell can be monitored without sample prefractionation.